I'm not sure where to put this article by the excellent Paul Rees as it was before last weekend's HC matches. But it is germane to the situation of the French national team and will be of interest to some.
THE POWER OF FRANCE'S TOP 14
French rugby has long been regarded from outside as an enigma. It has been seen as an antidote to the trench rugby being waged elsewhere; racehorses rather than shire horses, as one writer put it in the 1960s, a feast of unpredictability.
A few weeks after France were thrashed by Australia in Paris, taking their points conceded against two Tri-Nations sides this year to three figures after crashing to South Africa in the summer, seven French clubs lined up in the third round of the Heineken Cup.
Racing Métro were at Saracens, Toulon were in Reading to face London Irish, Perpignan welcomed Leicester, Castres were at home to Edinburgh, Toulouse travelled to Glasgow, Clermont Auvergne entertained Leinster and Biarritz, who had not lost since September, went to Aironi, who had not won all season.
Biarritz were the biggest bankers to win but they ended up the only losers. If they confirmed the stereotype of the French being poor travellers, Racing, Toulon and (again) Toulouse shredded it. All the leading French clubs have at least a handful of players from other countries: old shibboleths now have little relevance.
The French, or at least some clubs, have had an ambivalent attitude towards the Heineken Cup and the Challenge Cup, yet at the halfway stage of this season's tournaments they top all five pools of the latter and two out of six of the former.
Biarritz and Toulouse lead their Heineken Cup pools having played two of their first three matches away from home. Castres, Clermont, Toulon, Perpignan and Racing are all handily placed, with no French side losing more than one match. Cue the complaints from Premiership clubs about the relatively low salary cap in England.
Leicester lead the way, yet they are well-placed in their group, one point ahead of Perpignan and Scarlets who each have only one more home match left compared to the Tigers' two. Northampton are one of only two clubs with a 100% record and Wasps are two points behind unbeaten Toulouse. Bath and London Irish have it all to do after suffering a defeat at home and Saracens will struggle not to finish at the bottom of their pool.
Yet if the club scene appears healthy in France – the race for the Top 14 title is open, with such sides as Stade Français and Perpignan not in the top half of the table – the national side is another matter, even if Les Bleus won the grand slam last season. There are tensions between club and country that have left the national coach, Marc Lièvremont, claiming that he is having to work against the Top 14 sides.
The Toulon coach, Philippe Saint-André, whose starting line-up at London Irish on Sunday contained only five players who were qualified to play for France, said this week that in France, the Top 14 is regarded as more important than the national team. "There are more people watching and more interest in the newspapers," he said. "It looks a little bit like the English Premier League in football."
It was ever thus. In their 1961 book, The Rise of French Rugby, Alex Potter and Georges Duthen, talking about the game at the start of the 1930s, wrote: "The mass of fans loved the international games; for the club championship, it had a passion. The sporting community, particularly in the south of France, seemed to live for this competition. Local rivalries, especially in the regional finals, were white hot. Qualify at any cost was the motto. Nothing was barred. Brutal play grew. Brawls, pugilistics and worse broke out almost everywhere.
"Fans, appearing to be suffering from some frightful grievance, invaded grounds. Referees (all tough chaps, for the non-tough declined to take the risks) were jostled, insulted and 'if necessary' beaten. If a team were reckless enough to win away from home, so much the worse for it."
France were thrown out of the Five Nations Championship that decade as clubs, the number of which had more than quadrupled, decided that amateurism was for others. In 1952 the French Rugby Federation (FFR) only survived a call to be suspended from the International Rugby Board, which said it was disturbed by the actions of some clubs, after agreeing to disband the championship on the grounds that players were paid, along with transfer fees, that referees were regularly beaten up and that players were given bogus identities.
The FFR relented after the clubs agreed to observe scrupulously the regulations governing amateurism and fair play. Today, the club game only thrives at a professional level in France and England, with all the other major unions having taken the regional/provincial/franchise route, but in one sense the French stand alone.
The deal over the management of elite players agreed by the Premiership and Twickenham gives the England management regular access to the national squad and a joint say in aspects like treatment of injuries. The Top 14 clubs agreed that this season at least 50% of all squads would be homegrown players, with the figure rising to 70% from next season, but restrictions do not apply to match-day squads.
Lièvremont, who wanted the Top 14 to be trimmed to 12 clubs, is envious of Johnson. "If French rugby retains this present structure then we will suffer other such defeats [Australia], no matter who the coach is," he said this week, arguing that France should adopt the English model of close co-operation between club and country.
He has as much chance as Aironi have of winning the Heineken Cup next May. The spirit of liberty and independence runs through French rugby; the tricolore flutters alone.