Sport

France on a mission

France will be counting on settling a couple of scores when they take on World Champions Australia in the Stade de France tonight…

Sat Nov 04 2000 - 00:00

France will be counting on settling a couple of scores when they take on World Champions Australia in the Stade de France tonight.

Australia beat the French 3512 in the 1999 World Cup final in Cardiff almost a year ago and have outdone them every time the two sides have met over the past seven years.

Australian coach Rod Macqueen believes the game will be the most difficult in their three-match tour of Europe, as the world champions are without several key players. Of last year's World Cup final squad only captain John Eales, Joe Roff, Matthew Burke, Daniel Herbert, David Giffin, Toutai Kefu, Matt Cockbain and Michael Foley are in tonight's line-up.

"Every Test match on this tour is going to be a huge challenge for us but it is the French who we face first and they will be looking for some World Cup revenge," Macqueen said.

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France have Richard Dourthe, Christophe Lamaison, Fabien Galthie, Christophe Juillet, Olivier Magne and Fabien Pelous from their World Cup squad.

France: Thomas Castaignede (Saracens/Eng); Thomas Lombard (Stade Francais), Franck Comba (Stade Francais), Richard Dourthe (Beziers), David Bory (Montferrand); Christophe Lamaison (Agen), Fabien Galthie (Colomiers); Olivier Magne (Montferrand), Christophe Juillet (Stade Francais), Christophe Moni (Stade Francais), Fabien Pelous (Toulouse) Olivier Brouzet (Northampton/Eng), Christian Califano (Toulouse), Fabrice Landreau (Stade Francais), Sylvain Marconnet (Stade Francais). Replacements: Olivier Azam (Gloucester/Eng), Franck Tournaire (Toulouse), David Auradou (Stade Francais), Serge Betsen (Biarritz), Philippe Carbonneau (Pau), Yann Delaigue (Toulouse), Xavier Garbajosa (Toulouse).

Australia: Chris Latham (Queensland); Matthew Burke (NSW), Daniel Herbert (Queensland), Stirling Mortlock (ACT), Joe Roff (ACT); Rod Kafer (ACT), Sam Cordingley (Queensland); Toutai Kefu (Queensland), George Smith (ACT), Matt Cockbain (Queensland), John Eales (Queensland), David Giffin (ACT), Fletcher Dyson (Queensland), Michael Foley (Queensland), Bill Young (ACT). Replacements: Jeremy Paul (ACT), Glenn Panoho (Queensland), Mark Connors (Queensland), Jim Williams (ACT), Chris Whitaker (NSW), Elton Flatley (Queensland), Nathan Grey (NSW).