ITALY V FRANCE REPORT: The France coach Bernard Laporte is an admirer of all things Anglo-Saxon and yesterday his team followed England's example. They edged past their championship record of 51 points, set against Scotland and Wales in 1998, showing that they, too, can crush tournament minnows but they produced almost exactly the same game of two halves that England did against Italy two weeks earlier.
Even the scoreline was eerily similar at the end of the first quarter: 32 points conceded in the first 22 minutes as opposed to 33 in England. The Italian defence was in tatters with Paolo Vaccari having a nightmare in the centre, the record championship score of 80 points set by England in 2001 beckoning, but, as at Twickenham two weeks ago, the Azzurri upped their game once the match was lost.
Not that Laporte was complaining, after his side painted a picture of complete dominance from the moment Serge Betsen latched on to to Damien Traille's pass to open the scoring in the third minute, to Dimitri Yachvili's penalty kick almost half an hour later which put France 32 points clear. After the bitter defeat in Ireland, nothing less than a crushing start would have sufficed.
"In Ireland we defeated ourselves, but today, for the first half, we played rugby as it should be played," said Laporte. "There was precision, rigour and application. When they do badly I say so, so when they've done well, I say so as well." After the England defeat Traille received Laporte's ire, while the loss in Dublin left him railing against the entire side and the pack in particular.
The centre, however, was back to his penetrating best yesterday, with a brace of tries either side of the quarter hour, while the forwards gave the Italians no breathing space for the opening 30 minutes.
For all their youth, Laporte's half-back pairing of Yachvili and Frederic Michalak played like veterans. The former Gloucester scrum-half produced a devastating change of direction in play which culminated in France's first try, for Betsen, while his rapid delivery of the ball led to the third, for Traille. Just as importantl,y given the recent travails of Gerard Merceron and Francois Gelez, he produced eight successful kicks out of nine. If, as many predict, Michalak makes the French outhalf slot his own, yesterday could prove to be a vital turning point.
Italy are also discovering new qualities at half-back. The flu put Diego Dominguez out on Saturday, permitting his understudy, Ramiro Pez, to continue the learning process. The Rotherham outhalf looks to offer more options going forward than Dominguez. His try before the break raised Italian heads and his pass as Aaron Persico came in for Italy's third try after 67 minutes was scintillating.
The Italy coach John Kirwan said of his side's habit of performing only when a match is lost: "We're immature mentally. We're going out and making technical mistakes, but when we settle in we don't make those errors. It's vital that we go to Scotland and have a big game." If Scotland hope their visitors prove as fragile early on as yesterday, Wales will see it differently, watching those first 30 minutes of sublime French rugby with a shudder.
ITALY: Mirco Bergamasco; N Mazzucato, P Vaccari, G Raineri, D Dallan; R Pez, A Troncon; A Lo Cicero, G Festuccia, R Martinez, C Bezzi, M Giacheri, A De Rossi, S Persico, M Phillips. Replacements: G Peens for Vaccari (77), L Castrogiovanni for Martinez (53), S Dellape for Giacheri (60), S Palmer for De Rossi (53).
FRANCE: C Poitrenaud; A Rougerie, T Castaignede, D Traille, X Garbajosa; F Michalak, D Yachvili; J-J Crenca, R Ibanez, S Marconnet, F Pelous, O Brouzet, S Betsen, O Magne, I Harinordoquy. Replacements: O Milloud for Crenca (73), D Auradou for Brouzet (67), P Tabacco for Harinordoquy (70).
Referee: N Williams (Wales).
Guardian Service
