We seek, we seek, but we do not find.
No trace of Antoine Dupont in the cloud of blue and white players warming up on the Marcoussis training ground.
Normal.
We will learn, a few moments later, that he will be supervising the high intensity session from the bench.
“Antoine will observe his teammates and give us great indications on the strategy to adopt,” explains Raphaël Ibañez in the preamble.
Joys of captaincy?
Pangs of physical glitches, rather.
“He has a little bruise on his calf.
Nothing serious but we just wanted to spare it.
»What we can understand.
The first game of the November tour (against Argentina) is still a long way off and there is therefore no reason to go and wear down the machine unnecessarily.
Galthié screenwriter
So Antoine watches while Shaun Edwards yells, that Thibault Giroud tortures and that Fabien Galthié invents: the French coach devoted the last third of the session at work to match scenarios, the objective of which is easy to guess.
Matthis Lebel at the blackboard.
One team had to defend a five-point advantage and the other had to score at least one try.
It all starts with a simple analysis.
In the last matches, victory or defeat was played out in the last minute.
"
Any resemblance to the last matches of the 2021 Tournament is obviously not fortuitous, and this is to erase one of the biggest flaws of this team which, if it has proven its ability to speed up its game , still lacks control over
money time
.
Again against Argentina and Georgia, but against the All Blacks, the XV of France would be well inspired not to give points to a team that does not really need them.
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Sport
Fabien Galthie
XV of France
Antoine Dupont