Robinson and Laporte look on as dads' armies go into battle

England won a World Cup, beating France along the way, because the thirtysomething veterans strategically placed in important areas of the team brought every last ounce of experience to bear on events unfolding in the great rugby strongholds of Australia. Tomorrow, 18 months shy of the next global jamboree, the French will discover whether they are capable of playing an old man's game to similar effect when they field a Darby and Joan side - or in their case, a Darby and Joan of Arc side - against their traditional rivals in the pivotal contest of this Six Nations Championship.

The Tricolore pack, featuring five players who left their twenties behind them long ago, is already more ancient than the English unit that zimmer-framed its way across the line in Sydney in the late autumn of 2003. It is an extraordinary selectorial approach, to say the least. Fabien Pelous, the French captain, has so much of the Martin Johnson about him that he will probably figure in the next World Cup at 35. But Raphael Ibañez? Surely not. Pieter de Villiers? Olivier Magne? Thomas Lièvremont? Um.

"It's about form, not age," said Andy Robinson, the England coach, yesterday. He could not in all conscience have said anything different, given his decision to recall the 33-year-old Matt Dawson at scrum-half, not to mention his preference for the 32-year-old Julian White over the far younger and infinitely more modern Andrew Sheridan in the front row. Even so, he must be mildly surprised to find himself planning for the likes of Ibañez and Magne, who now play their club rugby in the Guinness Premiership - a long-established, if not particularly tranquil, home for foreign players in their dotage.

At this stage in the World Cup cycle, when long-term thinking begins to give way to detailed tactical preparation, the best coaches seek clarification. Perhaps Robinson and his opposite number, Bernard Laporte, are waiting for the greybeards to play their way out of contention. Dawson was understandably delighted with his promotion from the bench when the team was announced on Tuesday, but a starting place can be a double-edged sword. If he suffers the kind of humiliation experienced by Kyran Bracken in this very city four years ago, he can kiss goodbye to his chances of returning to France for the really serious business two Septembers hence.

Robinson, who has also to work out whether Lawrence Dallaglio will be a going concern come the next World Cup, sees tomorrow's set-to as highly significant. "We're very aware that the French will go up a couple of notches just because they're playing us," he said, "so while this game won't have an effect on next year's tournament it will certainly tell us exactly where we are at present. We've talked about it as a knock-out game, because whoever wins will go on to play for the Six Nations title next weekend, while the losers will effectively be eliminated. It is just about possible that a team could win the championship with six points, but I think my take on it is more realistic."

Forget the 24-hour drinking laws: certain players are supping in the Last Chance Saloon, with the landlord preparing to call time. Defeat here will force Robinson to address his burning issues in midfield - Olly Barkley, James Simpson-Daniel and Mathew Tait are beginning to hammer on the door - and reassess his options at scrum-half, where the Shaun Perrys and Clive Stuart-Smiths are demanding consideration. The back row is not sacrosanct, either. A single defeat in Edinburgh should never be the stuff of panic, but a second defeat on the bounce would shed a darker light on life.

On the other hand, French vulnerabilities and confusions mean England have more than half a chance of winning. "They are more disciplined nowadays," Robinson said, "but you can still strangle them and force their frustrations into the open. More than any team in the world, they look for a rhythm. Stop that rhythm from developing, and the pressure grows. Pelous is a rock for them, so we have to go looking for him. Frédéric Michalak? We'll target him. Florian Fritz has been suffering from a slight injury, Thomas Castaignède has been under the weather. We'll target them, too. That still leaves 11 others, though, and we can't afford to drop off them. Do that, and any one of them is capable of opening us up."

This is the fascination of the contest. France possess talent the game across the Channel seems incapable of producing: there is no Christophe Dominici to be found amongst Les Rosbifs, still less a Castaignède or a Michalak. Hell will freeze over before England run these people off their feet. But there is no reason why the new generation of red-rose forwards - Matt Stevens and Steve Borthwick, with Sheridan off the bench - should not make their bones against an elderly French pack struggling to fathom why they are still together.

And if it comes down to goal-kicking, which it easily could if the visitors set out to build a score for themselves in the sensible fashion they stupidly rejected in Edinburgh a fortnight ago, Charlie Hodgson is every bit as reliable as Dimitri Yachvili, if not more so. England by five? It is perfectly conceivable.

The three faces of Paris

* THE BRAVERY

It is one thing to spend an afternoon arguing the toss with the greatest French pack in history - a unit revered by many as one of the two or three most formidable ever fielded by anyone. It is quite another to do it with a dislocated shoulder.

In 1978, the Leicester prop Robin Cowling spent the best part of 40 minutes wrestling with the Gerard Cholleys and Robert Paparembordes of this world while suffering the torments of hell. Cowling suffered his injury early in the second half, but as England had already used the two replacements then available to them - Peter Dixon, the Lions flanker, had sprung a collarbone; Andy Maxwell, the Headingley centre winning his seventh and last cap, had picked up a knee injury - he refused to leave the field. It was an extraordinary effort. The French scored two tries following Cowling's misfortune to overturn a 6-3 deficit, and won 15-9. There was only one moral winner, however, and he was not wearing a blue shirt.

* THE BEAUTY

Eight years later England experienced a dislocation of the spirit. France were sublime - a back division boasting Serge Blanco and Eric Bonneval out wide, and Philippe Sella and Denis Charvet in midfield ripped into the visitors. When Sella rounded off a 29-10 win with one of the great scores, a length-of-the-field job beyond the imagining of any other team, England had conceded 100 points in a Five Nations tournament for the first time.

Again, England needed their replacements. Richard Hill, the Bath scrum-half, was summoned for the injured Nigel Melville after 24 minutes, and as France were already in fifth gear he was given a mocking "best of luck, you'll need it" message from his club colleague and fellow bench bunny, Stuart Barnes. "You'll be on yourself in a minute, and then you'll be laughing on the other side of your face," Hill said. He was right, too. Barnes spent the last 50 minutes of the game at full-back, with the blue tide washing over him.

* THE BRUTALITY

From a very early stage in the build-up, the 1992 fixture had a stench of sulphur about it. England had beaten France at Twickenham the previous March, securing a first Grand Slam in more than a decade despite conceding three tries to the Tricolore backs, two of them magical. A few months later, they had travelled to Paris for a World Cup quarter-final and won a ferocious game. It was now time for revenge, and the likes of Gregoire Lascube, Vincent Moscato, Philippe Gimbert and Jean-Francois Tordo were the men charged with leading the assault.

The French forwards took their instructions too literally by half. Lascube was sent off for kicking Martin Bayfield in the head; Moscato followed after wreaking bloody mayhem in the front row of the scrum; Gimbert and Tordo were deeply fortunate to last the 80 minutes. Stephen Hilditch, the Irish referee, left the field accompanied by armed police. And the score? England won 31-13, with Jon Webb claiming 19 points.