France toil to subdue spirited Scots

Great Scot, they almost did it!

It was a defeat that was a victory!  France won the opening match of the Six Nations when they beat Scotland 16-9 at Stade de France on a gloomy Parisian Saturday afternoon.  France scored more points but Scotland won everything else.

The pundits had them trounced, the 2004 wooden spoonists against the 2004 Grand Slammers.  But the wooden spoon came within seven minutes of outdoing the sceptre.  It was an heroic occasion, part of the glory of sport, the unpredictable.

The brave Scots shucked off their boardroom squabbles, the spate of injuries and the prophets of gloom to turn in a performance worthy of Robert the Bruce and William Wallace.

There were two decisions in the late stages of the match which will be debated long and with sad anger on dark Scottish evenings for years to come.

The Scots were leading 9-6 when Ali Hogg went running down the right-hand touch-line.  He broke free of the clutches of the French and went racing off to "score", but the touch judge decided that some miniscule part of his right heel had touched a fragment of the touch-line.

The Scots were leading 9-6 when Brian Liebenberg started an attack and Sylvain Marconnet won the ball back some four metres from the Scottish line.  France launched a hectic attack but the Scots defence was stern.  Then the referee gave Jon Petrie a yellow card for deliberately infringing, a crucial decision.

France tried winning from scrums but the seven-man Scots pack was honest and brave, and eventually Yann Delaigue capitulated and settled for a dropped goal.

That made it 9-all with seven minutes to play.

In those seven minutes Scotland had the first chance to score -- a remote chance.  Paterson's penalty attempt from inside his own half was straight but short.

The French, with bolstered loose forwards, suddenly had their liveliest period of play, winning turnovers for the first time in the match from the tired Scots and then came a heartbreak error.

Hugo Southwell was in the fullback position and kicked to clear.  Replacement Grégory Lamboley charged down the kick with two team-mates nearby.  Big Damien Traille got the ball and surged over for the try which won the match, as the TMO confirmed.  Frédéric Michalak, who had replaced Delaigue converted.

Traille's try was the first try of the 2005 Six Nations.

There were just under two minutes to play, a lively time but leaving the French winners.

There was a team in white in the first half.  They were labelled France, but it was hard to believe that they were as they did hardly a thing right, while the dogged Scots hung in there and had the better of the half, ending it with a great defensive victory as the French attacked in wave after wave.  Scotland led 6-0 at half-time, which was signalled by a referee's whistle and universal Gallic disapproval.

The only really good thing France did in the match was scrum.  That was also the worst thing the Scots did and they were penalised four times for scrum infringements.

In the first half, France had three kicks at goal, Yann Delaigue missed two simple ones with his left foot and Damien Traille missed from in front with his right foot.  Chris Paterson missed one but he nailed two, one when Jérôme Thion tackled and stuck to the tackler, and one when hirsute Sébastien Chabal went off-side.

For the rest it was the Scots.  Their line-outs were excellent, they won the turnovers, they had a simple game plan which involved Dan Parks leaning to his left and kicking to his right, and they tackled like killers.

In that half France put the ball into only two scrums while the fumbling hands of the French produced nine scrums for the Scots.  French handling was of a poor standard, starting with the service from Pierre Mignoni.

The good moments in the first half were a break by Andy Craig in the centre that led to the penalty against Thion, a big French attack which ended when Sean Lamont tackled Christophe Dominici out just short, a Scottish attack when Ali Hogg won a turnover, a Scottish pick-'n-drive, two brilliant bits of fielding by Paterson off French grubbers, a massive Jason White tackle on Brian Liebenberg and a Chris Cusiter break.  The best break of the second half was by Delaigue but a Cusiter tackle ended the threat.

It was not a great match but it was made gripping by the tenacity of the Scots, the closeness of the score and the possibility that the impossible would become a reality.

Man of the Match:  Scotland scrum-half Chris Cusiter.  There it is.  He outplayed his older opponent, his judgment was excellent, his passing crisp, long and sure, his determination unwavering and he managed a great break.  Close behind him was big Ali Hogg of the almost try.

Moment of the Match:  That almost try by Ali Hogg which will be watched over and over in slow motion.  It was a defining moment in the match.

Villain of the Match:  We suppose it was Jon Petrie for leaving his men a man short in those last seven critical minutes during which the French scored 10 points, but it was not malicious enough to be labelled villainy.

The scorers:

For France:
Try:  Traille
Con:  Michalak
Pens:  Delaigue 2
DG:  Delaigue

For Scotland
Pen:  Paterson 3

The teams:

France:  15 Pépito Elhorga, 14 Aurélien Rougerie (Ludovic Valbon, 17 -- Sébastien Bruno, 79), 13 Brian Liebenberg, 12 Damien Traille, 11 Christophe Dominici, 10 Yann Delaigue (Frédéric Michalak, 74), 9 Pierre Mignoni (Dimitri Yachvili, 79), 8 Patrick Tabacco (Yannick Nyanga, 64), 7 Sébastien Chabal, 6 Julien Bonnaire, 5 Jérôme Thion (Grégory Lamboley, 70), 4 Fabien Pelous (captain), 3 Pieter de Villiers (Olivier Milloud, 51), 2 William Servat, 1 Sylvain Marconnet.

Scotland:  15 Chris Paterson, 14 Simon Danielli, 13 Andy Craig, 12 Hugo Southwell, 11 Sean Lamont, 10 Dan Parks, 9 Chris Cusiter, 8 Allister Hogg, 7 Jon Petrie (Jon Dunbar, 80), 6 Jason White, 5 Scott Murray (Nathan Hines, 65), 4 Stuart Grimes, 3 Gavin Kerr (Bruce Douglas, 55), 2 Gordon Bulloch captain, 1 Tom Smith (Gavin Kerr, 75).
Unused replacements:  16 Robbie Russell, 20 Mike Blair, 21 Gordon Ross, 22 Ben Hinshelwood.

Yellow card:  Jon Petrie (69).

Referee:  Nigel Williams (Wales)
Touch judges:  Chris White (England), Nigel Whitehouse (Wales)
Assessor:  Stuart Beissel (New Zealand)
Television match official:  Simon McDowell (Ireland)