This Tuesday afternoon, the performance director of the French XV, Nicolas Jeanjean, spoke about the outlines of the week of preparation for a rather experimental French group which will leave in a few days for South America, where he will play three tests against the Pumas and Uruguay.
How did you experience this return to Marcoussis?
There is a lot of pleasure in getting together around the selection. There are a lot of new players, a lot of smiles and a lot of things to put in place. But we are used to this kind of challenge at the start of a tour. The challenge this week is to connect with the players, to balance their physical level. It’s an interesting week from that point of view.
Are there any players unfit to train?
Very few players are not fit to train tomorrow (Wednesday). There are a few concussions but those will come back very quickly. Hugo Auradou, who has not played since the end of March, is in this case. But he will be fit very quickly.
Will the players called up this week necessarily participate in the tour to Argentina?
No not necessarily. This is a first selection of a preparatory week. The group will be final after the semi-finals. For the moment, we are not able to plan completely.
Are there places for them to take?
Yes, there are places to be won. This is an important preparatory week for each training session. We are going to raise the sliders to get as close as possible to the international level requirements.
How are you going to prepare the players, concretely?
The international level brings us to a level of excellence. Everything goes faster and it’s arbitrated differently. On the pitch, you have to be lucid and to be lucid, you have to be physically fit. The goal is therefore to expose these players to these movement speeds and the fatigue generated. This is the goal of his preparatory weeks.
So what will the training against Romania consist of on Saturday?
The goal is for it to be win-win, for Romania and the French team to work well. We still have to finalize the content with the Romanian staff.
You have selected the Bayonne right pillar, Tevita Tatafu, for this internship. You’ve been following him for a long time…
Tevita is not eligible for this summer tour in Argentina (he will be from November, Editor’s note). The objective is therefore to have a daily and different eye on him, to see him on the ground.
He could nevertheless face Uruguay.
There is indeed a different environment against Uruguay, which will not be counted as an international match. We will see what the selection will be in the end. […] The weekday match against Uruguay will not be easy to manage. We will return on Monday from Mendoza (Argentina) and from Wednesday, we will have to be ready to match in Uruguay. It’s a game of planning and organization.
Will third row Patrick Tuifua, great hope for the position and currently injured, one day be part of the France group?
Patrick is a young player playing in New Zealand but he joined the federation through the under-20s. He is a talented player, with a size that is rarely found in Europe. Tuifua is a potential draftee. If he is not part of the group today, it is because he does not currently meet the requirements of the selection committee. Perhaps it will evolve.
Do you have any memories of a match in Argentina when you were an international?
Yes, in 2002. We then played against Argentina in Velez (a stadium in Buenos Aires). After Bernard Laporte’s talk at the hotel, the bus which was to take us to the stadium broke down. We requisitioned taxis and found ourselves in Argentinian traffic. We arrived at the stadium at the last moment and we played. We lost that day (28-27)… But that’s not the fault of the delay: the Pumas were simply better.
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