Rugby World Cup: Will France succeed ?

In France, more than nine million viewers watched Les Bleus beat England in their quarter-final match. Photo / Dean Purcell

Wouldn't it be great to be a fly on the wall of Francois Fillon's living room tomorrow?

France's Prime Minister is a rugby fanatic who has a famously stable marriage to his wife, Penelope, who is Welsh ... and rugby-crazy too.

The country is building itself up into an emotional lather ahead of tomorrow, in a tournament already remarkable for Les Bleus' highs and lows.

After a big build-up, the team had an awful pool stage, marked by fumbling on the pitch, tactical switches and tensions between players and coach.

There were dark fears at one stage of a walkout similar to the kind seen at the soccer World Cup in South Africa last year.

All is now forgotten after France thrashed their old enemy England in the quarter-finals.

As a result, the team's exploits are being seen almost as a morality tale, in which squabbling and disunity were overcome by courage and honour.

"The story of a rebirth" was the headline in Le Parisien after the victory over the English.

It documented visits to the changing room before the match by former Bleus, who strengthened faltering spines with a call to arms.

French success tomorrow will confirm rugby's astonishing rise in a country where the sport previously had only a regional following and was a poor cousin to soccer.

The France-England match, televised at an inhospitable 9am, was watched by eight million people, with a peak of 9.5 million at the end.

A World Cup website launched by the national TV network TF1 has notched up more than 775,000 visitors, and 210,000 watched the big match online.

Even to non-fans, the faces of leading players have become well known.

Renault is running TV ads for models "tested and approved" by Les Bleus coach Marc Lievremont, who was a zero last week but is now a hero.

Bayonne, one of the top rugby clubs in the southwest, offered half-price tickets for Friday's match against Montpellier to any spectator sporting a Lievremont-style pencil moustache. Fake moustaches, too, were permitted, to encourage a turnout by women fans.

Just in case anybody needs to remind themselves of the statistics for Wales-France matches, the rugby newspaper Rugbyrama is quick to remind its readers.

Since Lievremont took over as coach in 2008, Les Bleus have won three of their encounters, Wales just one. "Lievremont 3, Wales 1" reads Rugbyrama's headline.