Reports are suggesting that Pascal Papé will stay as captain of France for the Six Nations tournament despite the return of flank Thierry Dusautoir.
The Stade Français forward, capped 45 times for his country, was handed the role for France's November Test matches after Dusautoir was rested to fully recover from injuries.
The French won all three games under his captaincy against Australia, Argentina and Samoa and that was enough to convince coach Philippe Saint-André to stick with Papé despite the return of Dusautoir, sports daily L'Equipe said.
Dusautoir has captained France 31 times in 54 appearances most notably at the 2011 World Cup where France reached the final and Dusautoir was named international player of the year.
Asked to comment on the report ahead of naming a 33-strong squad for the Six Nations on Friday, Saint-André would only say that he enjoyed "an embarrassment of riches" when it came to naming a captain.
"The list of 33 will be announced on Friday along with the captain," he said.
"There have been rumours circulating. Some (L'Equipe) see fit to run two pages without a single comment from Pascal Papé or Thierry Dusautoir or from the French coaching staff.
"There is a lot of talk about that, but what interests me is the men themselves and the way they perform when playing. We want to continue on from the November Tests and to get off to a good start in the tournament with a dangerous trip to Italy."
France open their Six Nations campaign on February 3 in Rome.
Comments
cuw3100 says...
In Rugby the captains role and his influence is limited compared to a game like cricket. There have to be more than one leader and each player needs to play like a leader. Under Graham Henry NZ MIBs has a leadership group where the official captain was joined by guys like Read Thorn Hore Carter Smith Muliaina to guide the others at various stages of the match. for example if the skipper is under a ruck and the team can run either side, someone else needs to decide and the decision has to go down the line. The success of teams like NZ is this ability to take leadership by even some young guys. Add to that , there are many provincial level , age group level and super rugby level captains in the team, al of whom have many years of experience.
Posted 10:42 14th January 2013