Michalak has form to sink the Irish

By CHRIS RATTUE

Frederic Michalak has emerged as the man Ireland must shut down in tomorrow night's quarter-final in Melbourne.

While captain Fabien Galthie, the IRB's player of the year this year, buzzes around the forward exchanges, first five-eighth Michalak - who has only just turned 21 - is the man who has caught the eye.

The Irish must stop the French from breaking the line because once they get clear of defences they are masters at completing the job with their players swarming in support.

Michalak, who also plays halfback or inside centre, has led France's point-scoring assault in Australia, running at the line and putting players away with clever passes.

He has an accurate long pass as well, which means he can find the outside players.

This is something the Irish are concerned about and while they claimed, as all teams do, that they will not concentrate on one player, Michalak will certainly be first among their targets.

The French have battled to find a leading man at pivot. Gerald Merceron, who is nearly 31, had the job a couple of seasons ago, but dropped off the pace last year.

They were unsure of Michalak's credentials before this tournament.

But he has helped to engineer some scoring sprees, and is the tournament's leading points scorer with 78, through a couple of tries and a goalkicking success rate of just over 80 per cent.

Ireland have won three of the last four encounters between the sides, but the loss was a 39-point defeat in Paris in April last year.

Before this run of good results, the Irish had not beaten France in 17 attempts stretching back to 1984.

And they received many crushing blows during that time.

What are the points in Ireland's favour? Certainly not history, at the World Cup or elsewhere, although the European championship has certainly helped improve Irish standards and reduced any inferiority complex.

They did produce a formidable lineout performance against Australia, and this is vital. There are a lot of lineouts in modern rugby. To counter this, French coach Bernard Laporte brought Patrick Tabacco into the reserves.

Irish coach Eddie O'Sullivan has beefed up their ball-running ability with the return of 116kg No 8 Victor Costello, who represented Ireland in the shot put at the 1992 Olympics.

And most significantly, they had tougher pool games than the French. As New Zealand found against Wales, weak lead-up opponents can leave you unprepared for stiffer opposition.

If Ireland do upset the odds and win this game, the contrasting preparations will be seen as vital.

But too many factors appear to be against the Irish. Ronan O'Gara's goalkicking was not inspiring against Australia.

They went into the tournament without flying outside back Geordan Murphy, and have now lost Denis Hickie, who recently overtook Brian O'Driscoll as his country's leading try-scorer.

Murphy and Hickie each score an average of one try every two tests. They are players Ireland can ill afford to be without, and the loss of their pace robs Ireland of attacking options.

The Irish must look to O'Driscoll to find the gaps, but they may struggle to find the all-round attack to match the French, who have spread the tries around their squad as they coasted to four comfortable pool victories.

You could point to the French wings, the pace of Christophe Dominici or the power of Aurelien Rougerie, strangely dubbed "The Blonde Lomu" and France's leading try-scorer this year, as key attacking factors. Then again, you never really know where the French will strike.

They also have a brilliant back row, including the Cameroon-born Serge Betsen who led the dismantling of Ireland in Paris last year.

The calm and precise refereeing of Jonathan Kaplan, many people's choice as the World Cup final whistler if South Africa have been eliminated, should not be a factor.

Maybe, though, a change in historical fortunes can be. Irish rugby feels plagued by bad luck.

But X-factors aside, most pointers suggest a French victory.

Teams for FRANCE v IRELAND
(Melbourne, 8.30pm Sunday)

15. Nicolas Brusque v Girvan Dempsey

14. Aurelien Rougerie v Shane Horgan

13. Tony Marsh v Brian O'Driscoll

12. Yannick Jauzion v Kevin Maggs

11. Christophe Dominic v John Kelly

10. Frederic Michalak v Ronan O'Gara

9. Fabien Galthie (c) v Peter Stringer

8. Imanol Harinordoquy v Victor Costello

7. Oliver Magne v Keith Gleeson

6. Serge Betsen v Simon Easterby

5. Jerome Thion v Paul O'Connell

4. Fabien Pelous v Malcolm O'Kelly

3. Sylvain Marconnet v John Hayes

2. Raphael Ibanez v Keith Wood (c)

1. Jean-Jacques Crenca v Reggie Corrigan

Reserves:

France: Yannick Bru, Olivier Millou, Olivier Brouzet, Patrick Tabacco, Gerald Merceron, Brian Liebenberg, Pepito Elhorga.

Ireland: Shane Byrne, Marcus Horan, Donnacha O'Callaghan, Eric Miller, Guy Easterby, David Humphreys, Anthony Horgan.


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