Wales’ campaign at the World Rugby U20 Championship continues in South Africa on Sunday when they face their final pool match against Georgia. The winners will meet either Australia or New Zealand for fifth place, but Mark Jones’ side must absorb the lessons of their defeat to France, according to Welsh rugby coach, analyst, and consultant, Tomas Marks.
Having lost against France in the final pool match, Wales U20s should take a lot of learning from that match going forward into their fourth game and middle tier match against Georgia on Sunday.
Wales lost to an exceptional team and the number one seeds of this competition.
France are going through a golden generation as their U20s are going for their third consecutive world title, having won in 2018 and 2019.
This new and talented group are following in the footsteps of current French stars Romain Ntamack, Cameron Woki, Demba Bamba, Ethan Dumortier and Jean-Baptiste Gros.
France were far superior against Wales even though they had a man sent off after 13 minutes, they were without Posolo Tuilagi for 55 minutes, and had made 11 changes to their starting team.
The French have strength in depth and they could still win without Tuilagi and eventually romp home by 24 points.
Having watched the behind-the-scenes footage of France U20s’ preparation on YouTube, it was clear they analysed Wales very well and their defence leader and centre, Arthur Mathiron, identified the backs move that Wales had used when Dan Edwards scored in the previous two matches.
https://twitter.com/TheOldArcade/status/1677001650790072328?s=20
The French did their homework on this play and they stopped this threat and claimed an interception try from an excellent defensive execution.
In defence, they nullified the “deux grandes mecs”, namely No.8 Morgan Morse and centre Bryn Bradley.
They managed to keep Bradley quiet as he carried only twice and reduced the carries of Morse to 12 as opposed to a staggering 19 and 14 in the previous two matches.
Morgan, though, still showed his prowess by carrying those dozen times and making a good line break.
The French were very smart in defence as they were able to thwart any line breaks from leading to tries by running in the passing lane between the ball carrier and the supporting player.
This showed high defensive intelligence, as this happened on five occasions after impressive Welsh line breaks from the likes of Morse, Harry Williams and Edwards.
In the set piece, they were equally as dominant as they minimised Wales to 60% possession from scrums and line-outs, which resulted in Wales not being able to launch from many set pieces.
In attack, the French were a joy to watch as they were able to transition from defence into attack rapidly and get the ball to their most potent runners and score.
The French are touted as favourites for this tournament as they can play a game with power and movement which is a winning combination.
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Their second try of this match demonstrated this power game as 149 kilogram Tuilagi detonated his way through four Welsh defenders and set up a try for outside-half Clement Mondinat.
But this final pool match for Wales was a mountain of treasure in terms of their development as players and a squad.
The positives from this match were that the penalty count was low, they made 10 line breaks, and scored three tries against the number one seeds.
There were some notable performances in the backs with fullback Cameron Winnett playing his best match of the tournament, making two line breaks, six carries and two positive kicks.
Tom Florence and Harri Houston were industrious on the wings with both scoring and getting 18 touches on the ball.
Louie Hennessey at 13 worked tirelessly with 11 carries and five tackles, but he’ll need to tweak his depth in attack as he was too flat on a few occasions.
The pick of the pack in this match was No.7 Seb Driscoll as he outshone the other forwards with 12 carries, 14 tackles and a try.
Driscoll could follow in a long line of quality sevens in the country if he can improve his continuity.
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The replacements that made an impact were centre Joe Westwood, with two creative passes, and 18 year old prop Joshua Morse with four carries, three tackles and one jackal turnover.
As the team reflect on a challenging pool stage they need to regroup for two more fixtures in South Africa.
The lessons in the opening three battles are that they need to improve the scrum and also recapture the accuracy of the line-out and defence.
In attack, there needs to be a mindset shift from defence to attack as the team has a habit of creating slow ball or kicking away quality turnover ball.
As a coaching team there was an opportunity to change the strategy with France going down to 14 men, as Joe Westwood could have supported Dan Edwards at 12 and picked off the French defenders with his play-making ability for 67 minutes, instead of a short period at the end of the match.
Head coach Mark Jones has made three changes for the match against Georgia match but wants to continue with the cohesion of the team and it’s disappointing that full-back Winnett has picked up an injury.
He played well against France and this match would have been his 17th game in 18 Wales U20s appearances.
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Wales have given playmaker Westwood a start at 12 and he will give the team a triple attacking threat.
Jones has retained eight players who have played in every match and this is a risk given they played three games in 15 days in the pool stages.
The bench will play a role in the outcome of this match and Cardiff Rugby duo Mackenzie Martin and Lucas De La Rua need to bring their physicality and poaching skills to give Wales an opportunity to qualify for the 5th and 6th place final.