Climbing mountains

France unveils Rugby World Cup preparations

PARIS (Reuters) -- France will climb mountains, play two friendlies with England, relax on the Mediterranean coast and rely on computer analysis during its two-month build-up to the 2003 Rugby World Cup.

The 30-player squad will be named on July 9 and assemble on July 31 at the Marcoussis National Rugby Centre, south of Paris, manager Jo Maso told journalists.

"From that day, players will have their weekends off but we shall live together, eat together and think together until the end of our campaign, hopefully on November 22 in Sydney after the final," Maso said Monday night.

"The World Cup starts in 10 months' time but it's already tomorrow. All the details have been sorted out. We know where we are going to stay, where we are going to train."

The French team will leave for Australia on September 29 and set up camp for two weeks in Brisbane where it will face Fiji in its opening World Cup game on October 11.

It will then move to Sydney until the end of the tournament, only transferring for short periods to Townsville and Wollongong for two qualifying matches.

After a week visiting six hotels in Sydney and six in Brisbane, Maso and coach Bernard Laporte said they had decided against taking a team cook for the tournament.

"Food is now safe in international hotels," Maso said.

The players' wives will travel to Australia courtesy of the French Federation but only if France qualifies for the semifinals. It will not stay in the team camp.

Laporte said August would be devoted to physical training while the tactical and technical practice would be a priority in September.

"We'll start with three days of physical and biological tests... after our June tour to Argentina and New Zealand and a month's rest in July," he said.

Altitude training

After the tests, the squad will move to the resort of Val d'Isere in the French Alps.

"Medical staff told us we had to spend at least 12 days at altitude and to go as high as possible," Laporte said.

The French coach added there was "no question of blood transfusions" for his players.

"But it's true that an injection of (lock) Fabien Pelous' blood could do a lot for some people including myself," he added.

Maso said all the players would have to sign an anti-doping chart.

"I have told them that I would regard a player convicted of a doping offence as disgracing himself, his country and his sport and that I would immediately kick him out of the squad never to come back as long as I am be in charge."

The physical training period will end with two games against England at the Marseille Stade Velodrome on August 30 and at Twickenham the following Saturday.

"We all know about the France-England rivalry but we'd like these two matches to be real friendlies and real warm-up matches -- not revenge for the Six Nations or an advanced World Cup game," Maso said.

Laporte added he had asked his English counterpart Clive Woodward if he could use up to 30 players in the two matches.

"We would like to be able to change our team completely at halftime so the players could get some match practice without having to face two complete high-pressure games in a week one month before the World Cup," he said.

Computer analysis

Laporte said video and computer analysis would play a major role during the technical and tactical sessions in September.

"We are planning to analyze about 100 games, the last 10 of the major teams, the matches of the sides we are going to face in Australia and so on," said assistant coach Jacques Brunel.

France now have a computer specialist working "nearly full time" who will be a member of the World Cup squad. Ten laptop computers have been made available to the players.

"It takes him eight hours to analyze a match but it only takes 15 minutes to show the results to the players," Laporte added.

"At the press of a button, our new program allows us to see all the scrums or all the lineouts played, for instance, by Australia over several games.

"Individually, we can prove to a player that he has to work on his left-side passing by showing him the bad passes he made over the last three months."

Laporte and Maso acknowledged the only question they could not answer was who will be selected for the World Cup.

"I'm afraid you will have to wait until July 9," Laporte said. "The Six Nations will be full of lessons -- particularly as we want to use the B matches to check on all the candidates -- and so will our tour to Argentina and New Zealand.

"We want all the players to stay in contention until the end and don't forget that things can change quickly in our sport."

 

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