The strength and bulk of Merle - 6ft 6in and nearly 20 stone - whom he admits to being a little rustre, or clod-hopping, allowed him the option of including a more dynamic 14-stone flanker such as Laurent Cabannes.Nobody appreciates more keenly the balance a national coach must strike between politics and sport, between pleasing the people and placating the Federation. A pleasant, ironic expression contrasts with a strong belief that the style he values so highly is the product not of undisciplined flair but of training and application. He said that there had effectively been two French sides playing - the good and the bad - and only a side that kept its concentration on scoring tries throughout the game had any hope of beating England.This is the essential philosophy of Berbizier, a slightly built career rugby man who, at 36, is only four years older than his gifted centre, Philippe Sella. In the second half, with the wind at their backs, they added only penalty goals. And although Wales, with their resilient defence, could take some credit for that, the French became less sharp, less deft and rather boring.If the crowd held their fire, Berbizier did not. France had won by a dozen points provided by the only two tries.

A decent afternoon's work - but not a full one.It was all very well for France to push the ball around like Italian footballers, imperceptibly working into position before springing the trap, but what would they do for an encore? Very little, it turned out. It wasn't that the match itself was soured by the Merle incident, whose only immediate impact was on Evans himself. And the often capricious home supporters seemed happy enough with the result. A year later his side, in the process of rebuilding after the 1991 World Cup, toured the newly respectable South Africa and gained the Test series by the narrowest possible margin - a 20-20 draw and an 18-17 win. Berbizier, relieved to have scraped over his first big hurdle, said: "Our mission from now on is to play rugby that people can dream about."He didn't try to pretend that France had done that for more than a few consecutive minutes last weekend.

It was not how Berbizier wanted his team's first home championship match of the season to be remembered.In 1992, a year after he had retired as France's most-capped scrum-half (with 56 appearances), Berbizier was coaching the team. A French disciplinary committee later cleared Merle of dangerous play (although he has been dropped for the game against England), but the damage had been done, not least to Evans. The opening picture of the unblinking lock, Olivier Merle, was particularly impressive. When the captain, Philippe Saint-Andre, first saw it, he apparently exclaimed: "He looks like a fairground wrestler from the Thirties." At which the prop Christian Califano was reported to have chimed in: "Yes, he should be wearing a tiger-skin." This was a bit rich coming from someone who turned out to have a snarling lion tattooed on his right breast, but never mind. Pierre Berbizier, the French coach, whose comments were being used to caption the photographs, said that Merle represented "strength, explosive strength".It was an unfortunate coincidence, then, that by the next day Merle was being accused of head-butting Ricky Evans, so causing the Welsh prop to fall awkwardly beneath a ruck where he suffered a double fracture of the left leg. On the morning of the match against Wales, L'Equipe magazine ran a series of portraits of the French players "as you have never seen them".

That is, stripped to the waist to show their muscle, and staring straight at the camera to convey their mood. They've grown up with success in a Scotland shirt without necessarily appreciating whatgoes into achieving it. If you take these things for granted, then you are going to fall by the wayside.". It could have worked out better.

Craig Chalmers, Gavin and Scott Hastings, Kenny Milne, Doddie Weir; they have all got 20 caps or more, yet there is only a handful who are playing like it. "What has disappointed me is that the senior players have not become the leaders. Johnston, one of the 1984 Grand Slammers, has had impressive success with the A team, so much so that many of his charges were promoted for the Canada game.However, when it comes to defeats such as those by the All Blacks, Wales and South Africa recently, Sole says, you can look no further than the players themselves. "There was a distinct lack of passion and a lack of pride and that, to my mind, is unforgivable."In his day, Sole explains, the senior players would lead the juniors, and gradually himself, Jeffrey and Finlay Calder took the reins from the likes of Rutherford, Laidlaw and Deans. "At present," he says, "we're short on one or two outstanding personalities like Calder, Irvine and Jeffrey." Why? Some cite the influx of English players: if the team is shorn of the traditional national fervour,then it is already a few points down.