Wales aim to bounce back against unbeaten France

3 years ago 39

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Laure Sansus of France gets through to score a try

Venue: Stade des Alpes, Grenoble Date: Sunday, 23 April Kick-off: 15:15 BST
Coverage: Watch on BBC One Wales, iPlayer and the BBC Sport website and app; listen on BBC Radio Wales & BBC Radio Cymru 2; live text commentary on the BBC Sport website and app.

Wales face another stern test as they travel to title-chasing France in the penultimate round of the Women's Six Nations.

Les Bleues have won their opening three matches and victory on Sunday would set up a title decider against England.

Wales started the campaign brightly with two bonus-point wins from two, but suffered a heavy defeat by the Red Roses last time out.

Both sides have made changes for the encounter in Grenoble.

More than 20,000 tickets have been sold, with home fans preparing to bid a fond farewell to fly-half Jessy Tremouliere before of her international retirement.

Wales head coach Ioan Cunningham has brought in a new front row, with Abbey Constable set to make her debut alongside Cerys Hale and Carys Phillips.

Kate Williams makes her first Test start at flanker, while Ffion Lewis is preferred at scrum-half.

Lleucu George has recovered from a hamstring injury to take her place in the centre, while Carys Williams-Morris returns to the wing having played for the RAF last weekend.

France have made three changes to the side that breezed past Scotland, with a re-jig of the back row and two changes in the backs.

A fit again Romane Menager starts at number eight, with Charlotte Escudero moving to flanker in place of Axelle Berthoumieu.

Alexandra Chambon will play in front of her home crowd having been given the nod at scrum-half, while her replacement Margaux Duces is set for a debut from the bench.

Cyrielle Banet replaces Caroline Boujard on the wing.

France were 33-5 winners at Cardiff Arms Park last year, and have not lost to Wales since 2016.

Wales will be looking to deliver a similar performance which rattled England for the first 30 minutes.

If France can avoid defeat this weekend, it would secure them a place alongside England in World Rugby's inaugural WXV competition in the autumn.

The competition is made up of three tiers, with the top three teams in the Women's Six Nations being grouped with the teams finishing in the top three of the Pacific Four Series, which features Australia, Canada, New Zealand and USA.

Wales are currently third on 10 points and will not be caught by Scotland if they can secure a bonus point in their final two games.

Ioan Cunningham in training with Kelsey Jones

View from the camps

France coach David Ortiz: "We can feel that the players are looking forward to playing again in a full stadium which we know well and in which we have an excellent record.

"Wales are going to give us a tough fight up front and we're going to have to be there for the full 80 minutes.

"It will be important to continue to play well and to keep our balance, in order to continue the evolution we have seen in these first three games."

Wales head coach Ioan Cunningham: "France will be a major test for us, they are one of the best teams in the world and we always knew playing England and then playing France away was going to be a major challenge.

"But these are the tests we want, we are an ambitious team and we need to know where we are and we have made no secret that we have to build our strength in depth ahead of the next World Cup.

"We have reviewed the performance against England and we proved we can compete and proved we can cause the best in the world problems, we just have to do it for longer.

"The players selected have proven themselves in training and deserve the opportunity to wear the shirt and as coaches we are looking forward to seeing them perform."

Line-ups

France: Boulard; Banet, Menager, Vernier, Llorens; Tremouliere, Chambon; Brosseau, Sochat, Khalfaoui, Picut, Forlani (capt), Escudero, Hermet, Menager.

Replacements: Riffonneau, Mwayembe, Bernadou, Feleu, Gros, Duces, Arbez, Filopon.

Wales: Keight; Neumann, H Jones (capt), George, Williams-Morris; Snowsill, Lewis; Constable, Phillips, Hale, Fleming, Evans, Lewis, Williams, Harries.

Replacements: K Jones, Pyrs, Tuipulotu, King, Callender, Bevan, Wilkins, Terry.

Match facts

Head to head

France have won 13 of their last 14 Women's Six Nations matches against Wales, including each of their last six by margins of 20 or more points.
France have won each of their previous 12 home matches against Wales in the Women's Five/Six Nations, preventing them from scoring more than seven points in all but one of those fixtures.

France

France have made 40 successful offloads so far this tournament, they have also gained 90m from their maul.
Pauline Bourdon has been directly involved in eight tries, three tries and five assists.
In round three, France made 848m of territory gain via the boot, they were also the only team to win all of their line-outs, with 10 from 10.
Carla Arbez has the biggest boot in the tournament. She has averaged a championship high 43m of kicking distance and 40.1m of territory gain per kick.

Wales

Wales have the shortest average pass distance in the Championship, just 5.4m.
Wales have conceded an average of 214m of territory per match so far - they conceded their highest total against England in Round three (290m).
Ffion Lewis has averaged the longest hang time on her box kicks in the Women's Six Nations (3.8 seconds).
Wales have won 89% of their line-outs in this campaign, while France have won 87%.