Two years ago Ireland won the Six Nations title in Paris as Brian O’Driscoll signed off on his international career in the most dramatic of circumstances.
It took a last-ditch tackle by Dave Kearney and a nervous scrum (or two) to lock out the 22-20 win as Joe Schmidt got his reign off to a successful start.
Now bidding for a third championship in a row, Schmidt won’t place too much on the fact that, no matter how you look at it, trips to Paris are not as daunting as they once were.
“It’s hard to say how much of that carries over,” Schmidt, who has picked eight players from the 2014 team for Saturday’s round-two game, told RTÉ Sport.
“It’s two years ago, and two years ago is a fifth of a top-level playing career.
“It was a long time ago, it was under a different regime, and a number of the players are very different as well.
“I think there’s always a fear factor playing France.
"And I know even talking to New Zealand players and All Black players, there’s always a fear factor playing France.
"If they get their game right and if they open the game and you give them breathing space, they can just do so much damage so quickly.”
New coach Guy Noves has made six changes to the France side that scraped past Italy last week.
“I think there’s always a fear factor playing France"
And, as usual, Schmidt has done his homework on the opposition.
“I think in [Sebastien] Bezy and [Jules] Plisson they’ve got really good kicking games,” said Schmidt reacting to the France team news.
“I think Max Medard, with his left foot from full-back, is a really strong kicking option.
“There’s no doubt they’ve got really strong carrying options: Maxime Mermoz with his footwork; [Jonathan] Danty has been a revelation.
“He’s a man for all seasons, he can carry hard and direct, he can be a little bit subtle and play late passes, short passes, long passes and then you’ve got the real running threat on the outside.
“I think their lineout will be strong.
"I think bringing [Alexandre] Flanquart back in there suggests that they are going to rely on their lineout to get an attacking platform against us and they are going to try to put a fair bit of pressure on our lineout.”
Follow France v Ireland live from 1.30pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Radio 1 and via the live blog on RTÉ News Now and RTÉ.ie.
