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Lievremont unleashes on his lazy players
Ben Carter
Roar Guru
17th March, 2011
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Ben Carter
Roar Guru
17th March, 2011
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1257 Reads

Sebastien Chabal, left, and Thierry Dusautoir of France tackle England's Nick Easter during the Six Nations international rugby union match at Twickenham stadium in London, Sunday March 15, 2009. AP Photo/Tom Hevezi

Imagine if St Kilda boss Ross Lyon told his charges after drawing the 2010 grand final with Collingwood that they were a disgrace to the shirt, then culled half of them for the replay. That would get the message across that he was serious about winning games of footy.

That’s just what French rugby union coach Marc Lievremont did after the Gallic Roosters lost last week to Italy in their penultimate Six Nations match, in front of 33,000 rabid Azzurri fans at Rome’s Stadio Flamino.

Of course, he may just be slightly bonkers in terms of a likely win again this weekend coming against the second-placed Welsh at Stade France, but the intent of his words remains worth appreciating.

Former French president and wartime leader General Charles de Gaulle would no doubt have approved. “Toute ma vie, je me suis fait une certaine idee de la France,” said de Gaulle on the opening page of his wartime memoirs (“All my life I have had a certain idea of France”).

So did Lamert, probably. It’s just that his was proven wrong.

Lievremont told AAP reporters 24 hours after the 22-21 loss by the defending champions that the French players “betrayed” him.

“They have betrayed me and they have betrayed the French national team shirt,” he said.

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“In terms of the tactics deployed, it defied belief. I didn’t recognise anything in their performance that we worked on. Do you really think that I told them to play as they did against Italy? I do not have the impression we asked them to walk on the moon. I do not ask for complicated things.”

Heck, he sounded like the kind of guy who’d give Sir Alex Ferguson a run for his money with analysis like that. Lievremont added that Les Bleus were cursed with “cowardice”.

He didn’t even bother to speak to the players in the dressing-room afterward.

“I have done the rounds of the French players,” said Lievremont.

“I am beginning to know them and I am having real trouble in putting together a squad…What is for sure is that certain players have worn the French shirt for the last time.”

So, moon-walking is out of the question for the Gallic Roosters – but not winning, apparently. If the coach has nothing whatsoever to do with it.

De Gaulle again: “Il vaut mieux avoir une methode mauvaise plutot que de n’en avoir aucune” (“It is better to have a bad method than to have none”). Well, probably.

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Lievremont has even given himself the option of making a whopping six changes to the starting XV for the final match of the competition – that’s nearly half the team dropped within 48 hours of the defeat. That’s like what the English used to do whenever Australia whipped them in an Ashes Test. This is serious stuff. And good for the sport to boot.

“Did rugby collapse because some of their previous matches were one-sided?” asked Peter Roebuck in The Sydney Morning Herald on March 15.

Okay, so he was actually referring for much of the article about the place of Associates at the cricket World Cup, but you get the idea … except if you’re French. Their collapse was publicly aired, live on television.

Lievremont even got to the stage where he doubted whether he could find 30 men who’d give a monkey’s whatsit for their national pride out of a possible 10,000 Frenchmen by the time the World Cup opens in New Zealand on September 9.

Lievremont’s Italian counterpart, Nick Mallett, was, understandably, overjoyed by comparison.

It was the Azzurri’s eighth Six Nations win in 11 years and the first against France. They even staged a comeback after being 18-6 down with just 30 minutes left on the clock. A try by fullback Andrea Masi, capitalising on some good passes, virtually sealed the deal.

“We looked like a really good rugby team, everyone contributed to this win,” he told Sportsbeat on March 12.

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“I’m really proud of my players and what they have don for Italian rugby supporters, who week-in week-out support this team and have been fantastic.”

Mallett added that “the wonderful thing about this Italian public is that they realise we’re improving all the time.” What price then for another Italian win to finish things on a high against Scotland tomorrow as well?

At least it must be said that no-one can deny – with a post-match speech like that – that Lievremont cares. How many other sporting coaches can say all that kind of stuff – openly, honestly, at a press conference, with reporters covering it and everything?

The only downside of the entire 70-odd minutes was probably the absence of de Gaulle himself.

Perhaps he should have been the man rallying Les Bleus that night in Roma?

“Le caractere, vertu des temps difficiles” (“Character is the virtue of hard times”), he would say, before a stern players-race rebuke to any further Les Tricolores doubters…

“La France ne peut etre la France sans la grandeur!” (“France cannot be France without greatness!”)

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Indeed. Magnifique!

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