"We failed to pressure him" – France could not contain England's Fin Smith in Six Nations clash
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France back row Francois Cros has opened up on how his side struggled to contain Fin Smith, as the Northampton Saints man led England to a memorable Six Nations win at the Allianz Stadium. Smith took all the glory in a Player of the Match performance, and also slotted the decisive conversion to seal England’s 26-25 win in the second round of the tournament
“He was very calm and collected.” Cros said. “I think England managed more structure with his game management, he probably plays a little deeper and we failed to pressure him. That disappointed me as we’d talked about that before the match. He was impressive and I think we’ll see a lot more of him in test matches.
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“But for us, the focus has to be to stop the errors we forced upon ourselves. Yes, England defended well and put us under pressure, but the lasting feeling we have is that our efficiency in finishing and the way we failed to exit from our own half in the last quarter just allowed England a foothold into the match and their efficiency in finishing was a big factor in the final score.”
The result shattered any French hopes for a Grand Slam, yet Les Bleus still have their sights set upon their first Six Nations title since Antoine Dupont lifted the silverware in 2022. Cros continued on how he was frustrated in how his side struggled to kick into their top gear against Steve Borthwick’s men. France through away at least three guaranteed scores, as Dupont, Damian Penaud and Peato Mauvaka all spilled the ball with the try line in their grasp.
“Yeah, of course, we are disappointed tonight. We played well in that first half and created some chances that we didn’t take. We have a lot of opportunity to score the last ten minutes before the break but our execution was poor, passes went to floor not to hand and it wasn’t what we expect from ourselves.
“The last quarter wasn’t good for us. We failed to exit in the way we wanted and England kept putting pressure back on to us. We missed too many opportunities to score tonight, to win a game and that is down to our control and precision. England had five visits, I think, in our 22, and they scored four tries- that’s not good for us and it’s way below the standards we expect.”
England’s defensive line was firing off the line, with the back row in particular taking a starring role at the collision area. Ben Earl and Tom Curry were namechecked by Cros, with ‘game recognising game’, from one back row bruiser to the others.
“The English team had a very good defensive performance tonight. They put a lot of pressure on us and their back row were really abrasive- you expect that from players of the quality of Tom (Curry) and Ben (Earl). The ball was slippery, so they know they have to get up fast in our faces and they did exactly that. It’s difficult to execute well in those conditions, especially when there’s so much pressure on our breakdown, and England got a lot of territory from our transgressions.
“Two of those penalties in the second half and that allowed them to come in our 22 from the penalty and score far too easily. It’s something we need to look at and our discipline was less than we’d expect.”
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