Les Bleus winger Wesley Fofana is tryline-bound at Stade de France on Saturday night. Image: ABC Grandstand
Oh dear. Perhaps the only positive to take out of the France-Australia game on Sunday morning was that the 9pm kickoff in Paris meant we got to see the game at the very gentlemanly time of 7am AEDT.
Otherwise, it was another disappointing display from the Wallabies, only two weeks after the same side had more than held their own against the All Blacks. They simply had no answer for the dominant French, and the 33-6 scoreline certainly reflects that.
Over on The Roar today, I provide yet another post mortem for a game best forgotten: http://www.theroar.com.au/2012/11/13/very-little-worth-remembering-in-paris-rout/
New Zealand: In a move that acknowledges commercial realities over that of tradition and emotion, the NZRU announced today that from the third Bledisloe Test in Brisbane next Saturday through until 2018, the All Blacks jersey will feature a sponsor’s logo front and centre.
New Zealand and France were the only remaining top tier nations in world rugby to maintain a clean jersey, which while it might appease the masses, it clearly doesn’t pay the bills. One of the great features of the Black Jersey in all this time has been the fact that it has remained clean (if you’ll ignore the small detail of the prominent adidas logo, which they also pay a hefty amount to display) in an age where the game has embraced professionalism in all manner of ways (official vitamins, anyone?).