France ready for 'arrogant' England

By Andrew Fraser

Laporte joins England attack

Thomas Castaignede has backed his France team-mates to punish English "arrogance" in Sunday's Rugby World Cup semi-final in Sydney.

But the Saracens star, who was left out of France's World Cup squad, says inflammatory comments about England from coach Bernard Laporte were over the top.

"The English are always arrogant in their attitude," Castaignede told this website. "Martin Johnson and all those guys are a bit arrogant.

"But you need to understand that it's in their culture. They don't have the same way of thinking as us.

"The English press are arrogant. They were saying 'let's go to the final and smash the All Blacks and that will be the only difficult point for us during the World Cup'.

"I think the French got a bit irritated by that and now they have the opportunity to show something, so that's why they are getting excited."

Laporte went so far as to say most people "hated" the England team earlier in the week, but Castaignede felt the France coach had overstepped the mark.

Now even England are scared of playing against us - I find that quite funny Thomas Castaignede

"I think that was a mistake and not really fair," said the former French star.

Although the Six Nations rivals have both won the Grand Slam in the past two years, Castaignede believes England's general tendency to come out on top has spiced up the sporting rivalry.

"There is a good atmosphere between the French and English, even if we don't have the same habits or culture," he said.

"We respect each other a lot and most of the French players respect the English players, but they gave us so much trouble in the past that we got a bit irritated."

France have emerged as genuine World Cup contenders after emphatic victories over Scotland and Ireland.

And Castaignede is convinced Laporte's side are ready to erase the memory of their 45-14 World Cup warm-up defeat by England at Twickenham in September.

roll on sunday and goodbye the french ...yawwnnnn here we go again From It's only a game Have your say on Scrum V

"Everybody in France is excited because I don't think they were expecting so much from the French team before the competition," he said.

"But, game by game, we have showed we are able to compete against the best and now even England are scared of playing against us. I find that quite funny.

"There was so much confidence for England at the beginning of the tournament and now they think 'oh my God, we've got the French in front of us in the semi-final'.

"We all know that the French are really dangerous in World Cup semi-finals.

"We are playing very well and I think we've got a team which is able to be world champions. Now we need to show that on the pitch."