Thursday Round-Up
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Thursday Round-Up
Roberts seeks improvement from Wales
Wales centre Jamie Roberts feels Wales need a 20-30% improvement to beat France.
"They are coming on the back of two victories and a confident French team is a dangerous one," said Roberts.
Roberts warned that Wales will face some big-hitting forwards at Principality Stadium.
"The game has changed. French flair is rarely seen now, certainly domestically in the Top 14 because it is a very physical league and some of the forwards are huge.
"That is what is coming on Friday night."
Gatland on France
Warren Gatland seemed in a confident mood ahead of Wales' clash with France.
Wales have not lost to France since 2011 and Gatland reckons it's down to his sides defence.
"Everyone talks about French flair and where has the French flair gone.
"In the past they had world-class quality players on attack.
"The reason there's not so much French flair anymore isn't that they haven't got the players, it's just teams defensively are so organised. There's no space on the field.
"You come up against an organised defence on the field and people who are as conditioned and fit as you are, you've got an ability to shut teams down and that's what's happened to the game.
"In the past they've gone out with the attitude of saying 'jouez, jouez, let's play' and for teams like us that's just happy days - we love that kind of thing, it's so easy to shut down."
