KEY POINTS:
CARDIFF - Two classy French backs of recent vintage give their team an outside chance of beating the All Blacks in Sunday's (NZ time) rugby World Cup quarterfinal here but reckon it will not be a pretty sight.
Writing in the guardian, former fullback Thomas Castaignede gave France a 25 per cent chance of upsetting the world No 1 New Zealanders while former wing and captain Philippe Saint-Andre was slightly less optimistic in The Times, measuring the chance of boilover at 20 per cent.
Castaignede noted the odds would have been about one per cent before the 1999 Cup semifinal won so famously by France at Twickenham but he warned there were crucial differences ahead of this weekend's match.
The playing style of the adventurous French in 1999 was markedly different to the conservative team coach Bernard Laporte has moulded this year.
"Under Pierre Villepreux and Jean-Claude Skrela attacking was what mattered. Under Laporte defence is the be-all and end-all, and that is particularly clear from his team for Saturday," Castaignede said.
"His plan is simply not to give anything to New Zealand, with two players with massive kicking ability - Lionel Beauxis and Damien Traille - to clear the ball as far from the France 22 as possible.
"For Villepreux and Skrela, however, this match turned out to be the ultimate expression of their attacking game, and it was that philosophy that made it one of the most beautiful games the World Cup has ever seen."
Castaignede said if France won on Sunday, they would then have the confidence to go on and win the tournament but suspected they would not and that the recriminations would be "seismic", particularly for allowing organisers to schedule a quarterfinal in Cardiff that was always a good chance of hosting these two teams.
"I don't see the All Blacks being caught out again. They have waited 20 years to win the World Cup and will not make the same mistakes they made in 1999."
Saint-Andre who won three games against the All Blacks as French captain from 1994-95 said getting first points on the board would be crucial tomorrow.
"If France get six to nine points ahead, New Zealand will start to get desperate," he wrote.
"No one has challenged them in this World Cup; we have not seen what they are like under pressure. France, by contrast, have been challenged and grown in confidence after coming through those challenges."
Beauxis had the ability to land penalties from inside his half and that would be France's best scoring option, Saint-Andre conceded.
"This will be a tough territorial game that will be won centimetre by centimetre; Beauxis and Traille give France the chance to claw their way ahead," he wrote.
"I put our chances of winning at only 20 per cent - but that is probably better than anyone else's against New Zealand."
- NZPA
