In Limonest (Rhône),
Are you tired of this endless group stage of the Rugby World Cup (for four weeks)? Rest assured, the players of the French XV too, as they all hammered home their pleasure on Wednesday of “getting down to business”, with the arrival of the “direct elimination matches”. And even if the Blues had the great idea of winning their opening shock against the All Blacks (27-13), a hiccup against Italy on Friday (9 p.m.) at Parc OL in Décines would be fatal. In this Thursday’s Blues newspaper, we return to two major subjects from the last press conference: the return armband for Charles Ollivon and the question of the hoped-for peak in form of Fabien Galthié’s group on the occasion of these big deadlines .
News of the day
We weren’t expecting any particular surprise in the announcement of the group facing Italy, and we weren’t disappointed. The main curiosity is almost in this captain’s armband that Charles Ollivon recovers. In the absence of the injured Antoine Dupont (that must tell you something, right?), it is in fact the Toulon third row who recovers something he had not known for so long. Fabien Galthié did not hide the fact that there was a lot of symbolism in this choice. “Charles was our captain at the start of our mandate, a great captain,” slips the coach of the XV of France. Then he was seriously injured. He worked a lot alone. He has had a difficult path and today he becomes captain again, it’s the blink of an eye. »
A rupture of the cruciate ligament of the left knee, in the fall of 2021, had in fact cut the wings of the player trained at Aviron Bayonnais. But through hard work, Charles Ollivon returned to the Blues (37 caps), with unchanged executive status, even if the armband has in the meantime found itself on the arm of the French rugby star. “We are a group of leaders, everyone is free to express themselves,” the person concerned explained soberly on Wednesday. We stick together to compensate for Antoine’s absence. » One thing is certain: this one is unanimous in the France group. “It has always remained the same person, captain or not,” underlines Grégory Alldritt. He is a leader of men, someone who knows how to find the right words, who sets an example on the field. » His childhood friend Maxime Lucu, savors in advance “a very important moment for us” against Italy, between the tenure of the Bordeaux player in the scrum and the captaincy of the Toulonnais. Friends first.
The question of the day
The prospect of France-South Africa, and even before that the adversity of an Italy expected to be “revanchist” on Friday, pushed the French press to a major question: the group’s peak form is really for now, three months after the start of preparation for the World Cup? Fabien Galthié wanted to weigh up this theme (“You have to be careful with this verbatim, I didn’t use that word personally”), before confiding: “We are where we wanted to be. Now, it is the terrain which will demonstrate, or not, the form of the moment. We will have an answer on Friday.” OK, we can’t wait to see this revealer via the Azzurri test.
“The break week did us a little good to recover and regenerate,” slips French hooker Peato Mauvaka in any case. Asked about this question of peak form, Grégory Alldritt quickly laughed, mentioning “top organizations”: “I even just beat my maximum speed this week. It was a great moment for me, I exceeded 30 km/h.” Take that Kylian!