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Auckland, New Zealand. France coach Marc Lievremont made a gesture of confidence in his players on Wednesday by sticking with the lineup that beat Wales in the semifinals for Sunday’s Rugby World Cup final against New Zealand.

The gestures French players made in return were somewhat less polite.

Lievremont said he had no hesitation in sending the 15 players who started in the 9-8 win over Wales back into action in the third World Cup final for France, in search of its first world title.

“It was fairly clear to me,” he said. “I still believe in my team’s chances, of giving their best and winning.”

Some French players weren’t ready to let bygones be bygones and were still smarting at being called “spoiled brats” by Lievremont for defying a curfew to celebrate their semifinal win.

“I didn’t appreciate that at all,” veteran lock Lionel Nallet said. “We were expecting the week to be pretty difficult as it was with all the criticism and all that, [so] I don’t think it was really necessary to make it even more so.”

Lievremont has been highly critical of his players at various times during the tournament, notably after the opening match against Japan and their shock loss to Tonga in their last pool match.

After learning players had left the team hotel against instructions, he described them as “a bunch of undisciplined, spoiled brats, disobedient, sometimes selfish, always complaining, always whining.”

Lievremont was more contrite on Wednesday.

“When I saw my words on the front page, and the outcry that followed, I told myself I’d missed the chance to shut my big mouth,” he said.

Lievremont says he has no doubt that his players are capable of winning on Sunday, even if they win ugly, as they did against Wales.

“Once again it’s a final, and if we have to win it the same way we beat Wales, I will accept that without complex and with great pleasure,” he said.

France is playing in its third final, having lost the inaugural championship match to the All Blacks at Eden Park in 1987 and to Australia at Cardiff in 1999.

While New Zealand continued its preparation on Wednesday, under heavy pressure to end the 24-year World Cup drought that has followed its first win over France, the All Blacks players were in a surprisingly jovial mood. Lock Ali Williams and center Sonny Bill Williams tried to turn a news conference into a comedy routine before being urged to take the situation more seriously.

In doing so, they provided a clear insight into the mind-set of a team confident in itself in the face of contemporary expectations and historic failures.

“I think it’s new for us all, but I think we’re all good enough to deal with the week in all of its individual aspects,” Ali Williams said. “As we’ve said, you either wake up tomorrow morning or you die tomorrow morning. That’s the reality of how we’re looking at it.”

The Australian squad received a visit from the great All Blacks winger Jonah Lomu, providing a small but welcome diversion as it prepared for Friday’s third-place playoff against Wales.

Australia coach Robbie Deans recalled fullback Kurtley Beale from injury, named Berrick Barnes at center and lock Nathan Sharpe to earn his 100th test cap among eight changes to the lineup that went down 20-6 to New Zealand in the semifinals last weekend.

Meanwhile, players taking part in Friday’s bronze-medal match and Sunday’s final should know that the world is watching.

Figures released by the IRB on Wednesday show record television audiences for the World Cup in France, Britain, Australia and New Zealand.

In France, 9.5 million people, or 73 percent of the available audience, watched Saturday’s semifinal between France and Wales, despite the kickoff time of 10 a.m. In Britain, the semifinal netted a peak audience of 6.6 million.

In Australia, a nationwide TV audience of 3.2 million people watched Sunday’s Australia-New Zealand semifinal, smashing the all-time pay TV viewership record and topping free-to-air ratings.

The match had a cumulative television audience in New Zealand of 1.97 million, excluding the tens of thousands who watched in public places, out of a population of 4.5 million.


Associated Press