Chris Cusiter respects France and 'wrecking ball' but says underdog tag suits Scots

Published on Thursday 4 February 2010 22:09

CHRIS Cusiter will lead Scotland into the RBS Six Nations Championship for the first time on Sunday preparing to stop France's new "wrecking ball" Mathieu Bastareaud, but welcoming the fact that the hosts are clear underdogs against a French team being tipped to win their fifth title and a possible Grand Slam.

• Chris Cusiter looked a relaxed figure at the captain's press conference at Murrayfield yesterday, but the adrenaline will be pumping when he leads Scotland into battle against France on Sunday. Picture: Neil Hanna

The Glasgow scrum-half took over the skipper's role with Andy Robinson's first Test match as the Scotland coach, following a notable line of No 9 leaders including Gary Armstrong, Bryan Redpath and Mike Blair, and it ended in victory over Fiji. The scrum-half remained in charge in the win over Australia and defeat to Argentina in November.

He suffered concussion in that historic victory over the Wallabies, Scotland's first in 27 years, but insisted that he remembers it vividly and believes that that battling 9-8 win has laid strong foundations for an improvement on three championships under the previous coaching regime that yielded just three victories.

He also has a better knowledge than most of what makes French players tick and what weaknesses Sunday's team may possess, having spent two years in France with league champions Perpignan, but acknowledges that the recall of Stade Francais centre Bastareaud to the Test arena this week has not made Scotland's task any easier.

"He is a huge ball-carrying threat; a kind of wrecking ball when he gets going and very difficult to tackle," said Cusiter, "so we don't want to let him get on the front foot.

"But playing alongside him is (Yannick] Jauzion who is one of the best, most graceful centres in the world. He looks like a second row but with the speed of a winger and great passing and off-loading ability.

"The two of them are big, ball-carrying centres, and then outside them is (Aurelien] Rougerie who is a fantastic player and (Benjamin] Fall, the young guy from Bayonne, so it is a big, powerful back line, and physically a lot bigger to ours, so that will keep us busy in defence, but we have different strengths too. Max and Thom (Evans] seem to play well against French teams, for whatever reason, maybe because they get a bit more time, and we hope that will continue on Sunday."

The back line begins with the half-backs and while Max Evans' attempts to stop and outfox an opponent more like Scotland hooker Ross Ford in size than any typical back will be intriguing, the battle between Cusiter and 21-year-old Morgan Parra, and fly-halves Phil Godman and Francois Trinh-Duc, 23, will hold the key to which back line attacks on its own terms. Cusiter is relishing the prospect.

"This is the side I look forward to playing against the most; I love the way they play rugby, I love the country, the people and it's a great honour to play against them. I haven't had a massive amount of success against them, winning just one game (2006], and they are one of the best sides in the world on their day.

"But I feel our underdog status suits us well at Murrayfield and to beat a team like Australia in the autumn was massive for our confidence.

"Our training has gone really well and it's about us executing it now on Sunday. That's what you get judged on and rightly so, whether you win the game or not, and our focus since we got together has been on winning. We have a game-plan for France and know the threats they will pose us, but we are in control of whether we win or lose this game.

"We have talked about starting with a bang; that's hugely important for us because if we let them settle as we did two years ago the game will be over before half-time. There are 62,000 tickets sold so far and we have to get them involved early on and let France know we're playing at home and that we're a proud team."

Cusiter is one of nine Glasgow players picked in Robinson's starting XV, but although the skipper believes "familiarity" will be an asset, he has also warned his clubmates they need to better their Magners League-topping form to beat France. "There's a level of familiarity about the Glasgow guys; we've been playing well all season," the scrum-half said. "But the point is, this is the Six Nations and it's a step up. From one to 22, we have to step up our game. Playing as we do in the Magners League won't be good enough on Sunday.

"The pressure's on, as it always is, but we're excited about the challenge and we're going to enjoy it."

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