France stayed on course with Pool D rivals Ireland in winning their opening match at the Rugby World Cup against ill-disciplined Italy 32-10 at Twickenham on Saturday.
France and Ireland are expected to play for the pool win, and a supposedly easier quarter-final, on the last weekend of pool play in three weeks.
“It’s very important that we started with a win, and we knew how tough Italy were,” France coach Philippe Saint-Andre said. “We wanted four tries, but Italy defended well. We have a win, but a bad injury.”
Italy also suffered, as center Andrea Masi lasted only 23 minutes at his fourth Rugby World Cup, carried off with reportedly an Achilles injury.
Like Canada did for Ireland, Italy practically gifted the win.
The Twickenham crowd of 76,232 sounded and looked like Paris or Rome for only the second match between France and Italy away from their homelands, but the French among them were given more reasons to cheer.
Italy conceded 11 penalties in the first half, an average of one every four minutes. Seven were in kicking distance and France took five of them; four to flyhalf Freddy Michalak to pass 400 points in tests and one by fullback Scott Spedding from inside his own half.
Italy’s bellwether scrum was not only impressively crushed by France’s, but it leaked too many penalties. Coach Jacques Brunel blamed referee Craig Joubert.
“We’ve had 12 scrums in all, and we’ve been penalized six times, and five on our put-in,” Brunel said. “[This] leaves us with quite a bitter taste in the mouth.”
By halftime, France’s lead of 15-3 was too much to overcome by an Italy whose talismanic captain Sergio Parisse remained at home recovering from a bad leg hematoma, still in doubt of making his fourth World Cup.
Real tries finally came after halftime.
France were full of ambition, but just not making the last catch or pass. Finally, Nakaitaci charged from his own half past a crowd of Italians with support inside by hooker Guilhem Guirado, who was tripped just before the try line. France recycled and Michalak’s expert grubber kick was picked up by tighthead prop Rabah Slimani, who scored his first international try between the posts.
Slimani’s replacement, Nicolas Mas, also scored his first try in his 81st Test, ending the longest drought in Test rugby.
In between those tries, Italy scored their only five-pointer. The forwards and scrumhalf Edoardo Gori drove France back to their line, where Gori fired a pass out to right winger Giovanbattista Venditti to score untouched. Tommaso Allan converted, to add to his first-half penalty, and that was all Italy had.
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