coach Bernard Laporte for blaming France's failure to win the World Cup on laxism at the club level.
Top coach Guy Noves has slammed national coach Bernard Laporte for blaming France's failure to win the World Cup on laxism at the club level.
Laporte accused French clubs of being inferior to their English counterparts after France's 24-7 loss to England in the World Cup semi-final in Sydney in November.
But Noves, coach of European champions Toulouse, said big European Cup defeats at the weekend for Leicester and Wasps showed that English clubs also had their problems.
"It just proves that all that is being said about the superiority of English club rugby isn't justified," he told L'Equipe on Monday (Jan 12). "We are being told that English club rugby is in better shape than French club rugby, and that their players are fitter and better trained.
"Certain people hold them up as examples, but they also have their off-days. So what are we to make of that?. The English are still world champions aren't they?
"As for those that keep saying that it's the clubs that are to blame, I do not agree and I am fed-up of hearing these lies."
Noves said Laporte had accused French club sides of lacking professional rigour, but had erred himself in his team selection policy for the World Cup.
Laporte had been wrong, he said, to take along to Australia players such as Toulouse utility back Xavier Garbajosa and Montferrand centre Tony Marsh, neither of whom were fully fit.
"You call that being rigorous? That showed a complete disregard for the players' health and in the end benefits no-one," he said.
"It's no use saying now that we need properly-trained players to play for France when we have taken the risk of selecting convalescents."
And Noves had sharp words for Laporte's defence of South African-born prop Pieter de Villiers who tested positive for cocaine and ecstasy in December 2002.
"If you are calling, like him, for a more rigorous approach then you don't jump in to defend a player who gets to bed at six in the morning and who tested positive for ecstasy and cocaine," he said
"The player in question is no doubt a charming person, but from there to select him for the French national side is just not on."
Laporte, a former club coach himself with Stade Francais, signed a new four-year contract as national coach in December and was given increased powers in his dealing with club sides to prepare the next World Cup held in France in 2007