“Feeling that we can count on each other is exhilarating”

Antoine Dupont (captain of the Blues, after the 30-29 victory over New Zealand ) : “Winning against a big team like that is always good and this success is foundational for the group. The shared experience helped us not to panic after the first period where we were dominated in collisions. Playing for the All-Blacks is always a huge honor and a huge pleasure, you have to enjoy moments like that”. (on TF1)

At a press conference, the scrum-half took the analysis further. “Winning this way, it gives a lot of joy at the end. This feeling, when we have to hold our line, of feeling that we can count on each other, it's exhilarating. It's a very strong feeling that we all shared at the final whistle. (…) At international level you have to be able to win in every way. What we were able to do. Deprived of the ball, we had a very good defense and we were able to score on turnovers, on the few opportunities we had. It's important to win this way. We often see the state of mind of a team in its defense, in all its efforts without the ball. And it was perhaps the match where we defended the most. And we had this state of mind of not giving up anything for each other to achieve our common goal.”