There is a titanic feel to this game.

It seems that ever since the last time we met back in the second round of last year’s game, both Ireland and France have been building up momentum to arc back around to collide again. We’ve both beaten the All Blacks, we’ve both won our opening round and this weekend something’s got to give.

I get the feeling that France are building something special at the moment. They are the definition of sleeping giants as far as the test game is concerned. I know it’s not right to say but I often get the impression that a lot of Ireland’s recent success over the last decade or more has been dancing in space left by the France of the mid-2000s. France the guts of 15 years, more or less, through the experimentation and constant tinkering of Lievremont, the dour, outdated – even for the time – rugby of Philippe Saint-André, the failed Toulouse transplant of Guy Novés and the muddled game of Jacques Brunel.

All the while though, especially in the last five or six years, has seen a lot of guys get test experience even as they floated in and out of the team through the whims and fancies of whoever the coach was at the time.

That has all benefitted Fabien Galthié, as ruthless a coach as France have had in decades. He has generational talent at his disposal, sure, but he also has a core of experienced test players that he can use to build in the fruits of France’s JIFF regulations.

If that Sleeping Giant in Paris finally wakes up, it’s not just the Six Nations that will feel it – the entire world will shake. But Ireland can hit the snooze button this weekend with the right combination of guile, guts and good old blunt force trauma.

France: 15. Melvyn Jaminet, 14. Damian Penaud, 13. Gaël Fickou, 12. Yoram Moefana, 11. Gabin Villière, 10. Romain Ntamack, 9. Antoine Dupont (c), 1. Cyril Baille, 2. Julien Marchand, 3. Uini Atonio, 4. Cameron Woki, 5. Paul Willemse, 6. Anthony Jelonch, 7. François Cros, 8. Grégory Alldritt

Replacements: 16. Peato Mauvaka, 17. Jean-Baptiste Gros, 18. Demba Bamba, 19. Romain Taofifenua, 20. Thibaud Flament, 21. Dylan Cretin, 22. Maxime Lucu, 23. Thomas Ramos.

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Ireland’s attacking improvement since the last Six Nations is the product of, in my opinion, outstandingly efficient offensive breakdown work. Since the summer, Ireland have chewed teams up with outstanding speed at the ruck that has allowed us to play with the kind of possession and passing numbers that we haven’t really seen from Ireland before. Come to think of it, that breakdown speed has allowed Ireland to put up the kind of passing numbers that we haven’t really seen from anyone, certainly not in the last number of years and the breakdown is the main source of that freedom to pass.

I thought Wales would know that – and I’m sure they did – but they were unable to get any kind of purchase on the Irish breakdown. In an environment where we won most of our collisions and had 72% of our rucks completed in under three seconds, Wales couldn’t live with us.

France, much like ourselves, have found a style of rugby that suits their strengths. Galthié has France playing a style of kick pressure that isn’t a million miles away from South Africa’s game but the key difference between them is that France are one of the best transition sides playing at test level right now. France will kick to you – a lot – pressure you as you recycle and then hammer you when you kick back to them.

When it works at its best, they are close to unbeatable because they give you no way into the game.

• They don’t make errors in their own half of the field, because they kick the majority of their possession there.
• They have the size, power and breakdown heft to slow down any side they play
• They have a defensive lineout that can scrag you
• They have a big scrum
• They have good halfbacks that don’t get sucked in to the emotion of the game and well balanced, disciplined wingers that give them excellent edge coverage and breakdown pressure

Ireland play more in our 22-50 than any other side in the Six Nations. France regularly kick their own possession into that very area of the field to defend the opposition on their terms.

Something has to give.

A lot of Ireland’s recent success has been bolstered by that ability to play from deep and “hack” the kicking tendencies of the opposition. Ireland of 2019 to 2021 would kick most of that possession back to you but now Ireland have been empowered – literally and figuratively – to play from the areas that teams like France will kick us into. Having Porter and Furlong in the same starting pack is a big part of that. Ireland might not be as big, man for man, as France but our skill set across the entire pack is better. We’ll have to use that to our advantage but nothing about that will work if we don’t have passable ruck speed. I don’t need 72% like last week but we if our ruck speed is down, we need to bring our possession percentage down with it. Essentially, we should not get hung up on the idea of playing from our 22-50 if the conditions aren’t right. We’ve got to have the confidence and execution to put the onus back on France to play in their own stadium.

France concede more than their fair share of breakdown turnovers themselves so staying patient and steering clear of overplaying in our own half is important. I’m not saying never go to our deeper structures in our 22-50 zone but perhaps leave it for the second or third sequence on a kicking duel when we might get some separation from the French pack. Remember, a ruck makes a start line for a race and a countdown clock – we want that start line and countdown clock to start before they are ready to run that race.

Unlike Wales, I think France will heavily contest a lot of our breakdown setups and actively look to clog our layered passing lanes with edge blitzing runners.

It will not be lost on Shaun Edwards that Ireland are, essentially, playing a rugby league style attack so the question will be this – does Edwards back the line speed and defensive read of his wider defenders to play “on-feet” and try to beat Ireland’s system of multiple handlers and blocks with numbers? Or will he realise that heavily contesting the ruck is the key to turning Ireland’s looped options into regular runners because they are running onto slow ruck ball and settled defences?

I think it’ll be the latter. If you slow Ireland’s ball, all the late-arriving screen runners like Hansen (and Carbery, to an extent) are way, way easier to defend and will force us to carry more directly into heavier traffic than normal.

If we come under extreme breakdown pressure, it’ll bring Gibson-Park’s kicking game into focus too and any errors there could be costly against a heavy French maul and scrum.

This will be a very stern test of where Ireland are at and I can’t shake the feeling that whoever comes out of Paris with a win this weekend will probably win a Slam this year. Let’s hope it’s Ireland.