Tokyo (AFP)

To cut the whistle: with a third of the central referees of the Rugby World Cup (20 September-2 November), France is the nation best represented in Japan, a situation that can be explained by cyclical and structural factors.

Jérôme Garcès, Romain Poite, Pascal Gaüzère and Mathieu Raynal will wear the tricolor colors in the Land of the Rising Sun, accompanied by Alexandre Ruiz, retained as touch judge. While other nations max out a maximum of two central referees (Australia, England and New Zealand, Wales and South Africa completing the panel).

Four referees central, it is one more than at the World-2015 in England, where France already figured at the top of the podium (Garcès, Poite and Gaüzère). In 2011 in New Zealand, only Poite officiated at the center.

And "for years, and even before I arrived (early 2000s), there were only one or two French referees (at the international level), never again.It was complicated to have people who settled at the highest level, "reminds AFP Joel Jutge, former French international whistle, now responsible for umpires at the EPCR, organizer of the European Cups.

- Thank you Top 14 -

They are now four or five (Ruiz), and behind them some young shoots, like Pierre Brousset or Ludovic Cayre, show the teeth.

Garcès is also in the "short list" to referee the final, November 2, after officiating in the final of the European Cup Leinster / Saracens in May. He also led the England / New Zealand clash in November 2018, as a test-match of the British and Irish Lions series at the All Blacks in the summer of 2017, one of the other two coming back to ... Poite.

The French refereeing benefits in particular from the bitterness of the Top 14. "When we referee 10/15 matches of Top 14 each season, we are, in my opinion, prepared to referee the big international deadlines. learning ground, "says Joël Dumé, National Technical Director of Arbitration until this summer.

But the championship of France already proposed knife matches there are ten years. It is then necessary to look for reasons in the advent of a "generation of excellent quality", when "certain countries found themselves in difficulty", in particular in Europe (Wales, Ireland but especially Scotland), underlines Dumé.

- Navel and politics -

Above all, the policy of the National Arbitration Technical Department has borne fruit. The referees became professionals in 2001 and, "unlike other nations, we did not put all our hopes on one and the same person," says Dumé.

"We were trying to divide the international matches where possible, to launch in the big bath several referees at the same time," he adds.

This in order to be able to rely on a maximum of reliable referees in the league. "The Top 14 is 182 games per season, it takes at least 15 good referees," says Dumé.

France has finally stopped looking at its own belly button and being "on the sidelines of what it was being done internationally", still according to Dumé.

It has the wind in its sails and must take advantage, because "we must be aware that things will become more complex in the coming months and years," warns Jutge since "the French referees will face a stronger competition."

Being well represented internationally is indeed an important issue in terms of influence for the federations. The powerful New Zealand, for example, has boosted promising prospects James Doleman (28), who led the final of the U-20 world championship, won by France in June, and Paul Williams (34), referee of a test-match between Australia and Ireland in the summer of 2018.

© 2019 AFP