The national coaching staff are not the type to bury their heads in the sand. Rather theirs is a heads-on approach to debriefing, which began as soon as they returned to France on Monday 14th October. It quickly yielded its first lessons.
Co-coach Gaëlle Mignot was blunt in her assessment: "It is not at all positive. This WXV was a big disappointment, both in terms of results and performance. We played teams ranked higher than us, except for the USA, and the conclusion is clear: we didn’t belong in this competition."
What about France's fourth-place world ranking, behind England, Canada and New Zealand? "We're in the right place," asserted her co-coach David Ortiz, fully aware of the challenge ahead as they also prepare for the Women's Rugby World Cup 2025 in less than a year in England.
"We need to keep building and evolving. We need to play tough matches that force us into a real battle and make us keep up that fight as long as possible during the game so we don’t give in," he explained.
“Like against Canada or New Zealand, we hold our own in the battle for a while, but at some point, we let go. We need to play these kinds of ‘battle matches’ and hold out until the end. We're not worrying yet, but we’re definitely questioning ourselves, and there’s a huge amount of work needed.”
No alarm bells
The French coaches keep repeating that there is a levelling up of teams across the global game, and what worked in the past doesn’t necessarily have the same impact now. In short, they need to change their approach.
“The level of women’s rugby is improving at an incredible pace. The Irish are a good representation of that,” said Mignot. “We need to play very high-level matches. There are moments in games where we’re neck and neck, but we don’t push ahead, and then the opponent takes the lead. These are the critical moments in the game where we’re not competing.
"We’re not totally worried or alarmist about this yet. We’re aware that as soon as we lose the momentum of the game, as soon as we lose our speed, as soon as we lose the elements we want to implement, our opponents punish us hard."
A desire to play - but at what cost?
The coaches acknowledge a lack of accuracy across the last four matches — including the warm-up game against England in early September — despite the desire to play attacking rugby.
“We need to find the right balance,” admitted former international hooker Mignot, who won 70 caps between 2010 and 2018. "Things we could do before against other nations, which worked very well, don't now that the level of everyone is increasing, evolving.
"The learning is to be able to gauge when to attempt things or not, while keeping the desire to play a high-tempo game because that’s what we're about.
"It’s about making sure of your pass when you go for the offload. The learning is to be able to gauge when to do it or not, while keeping the desire to bring volume to the game because that’s what represents us and will win us matches."
Cementing the squad for the Six Nations
Even though the management team are calling for more high-level matches, with fewer than 10 months between now and the 2025 Women's Rugby World Cup, the 2025 Guinness Women's Six Nations represents their best opportunity.
"The Six Nations will cement the squad. We’ll have to find the right balance in matches to have this youth, this experience, this energy, tacklers, ball carriers, so we have the best-prepared team at the right time," said Mignot.
A warm-up match is also expected against England in the summer of 2025. The Red Roses, undeniable favourites on home soil, enter the tournament with a sense of invincibility in many eyes. It’s precisely this mindset that France wish to adopt. Favourites in the pool stage, perhaps, but they could be seen as dark horses in the quarter-finals — the match they absolutely cannot afford to lose.
