It has been well documented that the French rugby team, long beloved of romantics everywhere, have undergone a violent personality change under the artless direction of Phillipe Saint Andre.
This personality change was welcomed by precisely no one. Not even teams who were now suddenly able to beat them felt satisfied at this development.
As if in reaction to all this keening, the French overcompensated wildly for this on the final weekend of the Six Nations. They were exaggeratedly French. It was like watching a collection of performers doing an extreme parody of a French rugby team.
The whole thing was more French than one of those erotic, art-house movie from the 1970s that TnaG used to show on Friday evenings, starring Gerard Depardieu and Brigette Bardot.
Here, in all their glory, are the most French things we've seen in sport down the years.
Smoking hot rugby - the whole of the 80s and early 90s
French rugby in the 80s and early 90s, their backs moved like whippets, their jerseys loosely rippled in the breeze, they tossed the ball around, always operating (and thriving) on the edge of chaos.
Whenever a pass went astray that was merely a prelude to another piece of dazzling, improvisational rugby, keeping the move alive on the way to a triumphant touchdown in the corner. Rugby union was a much messier, more anarchic game back then and the French were the most anarchic of all. Their backs were marvels of free association.
Then after the Irish were dispatched, they'd retreat to the dressing room for a post-match fag. Winger Niall Woods recalls going into the French dressing room to change jerseys after Ireland's 25-7 loss in 1995 and not being able to see a thing through the fog of cigarette smoke.
Blanco... Sella... Camberabero - 1991
It's almost sacrilegious to think that a man involved in this try - the man who scored it no less - could be responsible for putting out a team that played the kind of guff France have inflicted on their supporters in the past few years.
Serge Blanco was the real inspiration behind this move, when after collecting a missed Simon Hodgkinson penalty, he decided to scamper across his own goal-line and start an attack on the far wing. He slipped the ball to Lafond who shifted it off to Sella, who cut inside and passed to out-half Camberabero. He dinked the ball over the oncoming wing, re-gathered and just booted the ball into the centre.
2010 World Cup...
The French international teams seem to have no passion for sacking managers. Patently unsuitable and fairly damaging figures are left in roles long after everyone should have lost patience with them. The most dramatic example of this was, of course, Mr. Domenech who was let stay in the job long enough to make a spectacle of France at the World Cup.
Even after a shambolic qualifying campaign, the federation took the suicidal decision to let him lead the side to the World Cup.
The insolence of the players was archetypally French. The squad decided en masse that they couldn't be arsed if the whole thing went tits up.
Their reaction to Zidane's headbutt - 2006
Had Zinedine Zidane been English, he'd have been pilloried to within an inch of his life.
The French, however, revelled in the enigma, the mysterious complexity of it all, turning their guns on Matterazzi, demanding to know how he provoked their hero.
Bernard Henri-Levy, a French intellectual, came up with the most French explanations of them all.
An intellectual in France is a handsome middle aged man who smokes a lot and has wavy brown hair, undoes the top button of his white shirt and talks in enigmatic terms about stuff that no one understands. Bernard Henri-Levy is a classic French intellectual.
Levy announced that Zidane had committed the 'suicide of a demi-God'.
Zidane, he indicated, had glimpsed the immortality that would be conferred on him if he guided France to the 2006 World Cup and decided, deep down, he didn't want it.
Therefore, he took a conscious decision to undermine this. Hence the headbutt.
Will I just hold the ball in the corner here? - 1993
The most self-defeating nation in world football were cruising in Group D, sitting serenely on top of the table ahead of Sweden and Bulgaria. Gerard Houllier’s men needed one point (yes, one point) from their remaining two home games against the behemoths of Israel and Bulgaria. For Israel in 1993, read someone like Georgia today. The French newspapers boldly printed the following days headline which was to be ‘QUALIFIED.’ Not only that but, according to Phillipe Auclair in his brilliant biography of Eric Cantona, a number of the French superstars (not, apparently, including Cantona) decided to prepare for the little Israelis by going out on the razz and taking home some women. Unbelievably, the French were drawing 2-2 with minutes remaining, a dreadfully underwhelming result but enough. To the amazement of everyone present, the Israeli’s managed to snatch a win in the final minutes.
This was disturbing but still, all they needed was a draw at home to the qualification-chasing Bulgaria four days later and it would be enough. Cantona scored early, and France breathed a sigh of relief. However the dogged Bulgarians equalised on the stroke of half-time. Clearly, the French were spooked. Late in the game, David Ginola (who was somewhat unfairly blamed for the whole fiasco by the typically classless Houllier) over-hit a cross when he’d have been wiser to hold it in the corner and Bulgaria’s counter-attack ended with Emil Kostadinov smashing the ball past track-suited goalkeeper Bernard Lama. Houllier and Aime Jacquet looked like they’d seen a ghost. As a nation, the French would boo a children’s nativity play if they felt it wasn’t up to scratch, and truly the booing that night in the Parc des Princes was something to behold.
Seagulls following trawlers - 1995
Into the rough and ready world of English professional football in the early-to-mid 1990s arrived Eric Cantona like a professional Frenchman. He may as well have been wearing a beret and a black and white stripey shirt and carrying a long bread roll under his arm.
Historic triple bogeys - 1995
The French have never been ones for golf. However, during one of the only tournaments ever where a Frenchman was seriously contending, they provided us with one of the most memorable moments in the history of the sport.
It was as if Jean Van de Velde knew that he would be better remembered for a spectacular cock-up than he would be for a diligent final hole and a British Open win.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWqr-NAfGro
Cavalier bench-emptying - most years
Between 1974 and 2008, the French repeatedly insulted Ireland by substituting their best players with about twenty minutes left in the game.
It almost never cost them. The phrase 'bench-emptying' became part of rugby parlence thanks to the French rugby team. By the 60th minute, they'd have jogged in a couple of tries and they'd arrogantly decide to give the sucker an even break. It was almost as it the French decided to give us a reason to feel good about ourselves in spite of the hammering.
Ireland had so many glorious rallies in the final quarter of these games. The most famous was in 2006.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCpXSrPflYQ
