Wales have threats all over the park but Jefferson Poirot has singled out Tomas Francis as one of the key men France will have to nullify in their World Cup quarter-final.
Les Bleus take on the Grand Slam champions in Oita on Sunday in the only last eight match featuring two unbeaten teams.
Poirot, who captained France in their last Pool stage win over Tonga, believes that the scrum will be one of the key battlefields in the encounter, with Francis having shown how much of a threat he can be in the set-piece.
Wales have already gone through some big tests in the scrum, notably in their first two games against Georgia and Australia, with Poirot suitably impressed.
He said: “They’re a team which hasn’t necessarily changed since the Guinness Six Nations. They won the Grand Slam – they didn’t have much to change. They’re tough in the scrum, with a tight-head prop, Tom Francis, who can be decisive. That will be our big battle on Sunday.
“The Welsh scrum is a strategic scrum. Against Georgia, we saw that, for the first scrums, they got the ball away quickly, but in the third scrum, they chose to go for a double shove. It’s a very intelligent scrum, which gets the measure of the opposition.
“We’ll be tested and we’ll have to turn up whatever happens to encourage the Welsh to get the ball away quickly so we can focus on the game and on building intensity.”
While Poirot has been impressed by the Welsh scrum, he admits France have been a little more up and down in that department.
They struggled early on against Argentina before turning things around, while they were also under the cosh at times against Tonga.
And that has been a key focus for Les Bleus this week as they try to fix the little details which have been holding them back.
He added: “I think we lost our coordination a bit. Lots of little details have big consequences. We’ve been able to work on that thanks to the England match being cancelled.
“But working on it doesn’t provide any guarantees: we’ll have to validate that. We’re aware of that, and we hope to put in a great performance.”
