Well Didds,
He is the man who resurrected French Flair, so I suspect he knows a bit about coaching Rugby.
Pierre Villepreux (on ESPN):
"I worked as a PE teacher while I was playing rugby," explains Villepreux. "When I played you didn't have coaches, you had the selectors and the captain. But my profession allowed me to reflect on how we train as rugby players and how to develop the intelligence of the player on the field. I thought a lot about that.
"It wasn't about telling them what to do. It was the opposite of that. But it was getting everyone on the same page in terms of thinking on their feet. Players should be constantly thinking on the field of play, not just programmed with a set-list of moves."
He is very much aware of the need of finding a balance between the game of movement and the set piece.
This is a fascinating conversation between Lynn Evans and Pierre Villepreux and sets the tone for playing the game of rugby in movement.
Coaching in France is built around this philosophy, that of understanding the game and why it works the way it works. In order to help the player to a better understanding of the game, the coach has to first dissect it for himself. In this clip he explains a little his coaching style. A player with good technique but a poor understanding of the game will not get the best out of him/herself on the field. What we would call ability to read the game, come before technique, before the physicality. Even in England rugby is still called the thinking man's game.
