Training squad

Mon dieu, England hit the bar again in Paris as they lose, win and then lose again in an excellent game of rugby. I did turn to SWMBO when coach Lancaster took off Danny Care and Dylan Hartley, and said I thought it was a mistake to unsettle the side at this crucial stage.

That said,  England did make enough line breaks to have the game sewn up after 70 minutes but nobody got up with the breakaway player to take the scoring pass. A true openside flanker would maybe have made the difference. Fair to say though that the French try deserved to win any game and was a throw back to pre-professional days when the French could strike from anywhere on the pitch. Hopefully this will inspire them to try it more often.

Still we did not let an England defeat, or my bad back, ruin a jolly weekend in Paris. We had not been for about ten years, having favoured Rome more recently, but a change is as good as a rest, and Paris always comes up trumps. I dug out my old tourist maps and found six metro tickets amongst them, and after ten years they still worked, that saved us a few Euro's.

We went to a regular watering hole, Chez Paul, near Bastille, after the game and spent a merry few hours with some other Twickenhamites who had also made the trip South.

Sunday morning saw us stroll through the local market where a mixture of fruit, veg, fish and meat was available for the locals to buy for their Sunday lunch. Further down the street was a bit of a flea market but nothing caught the eye.

Our priority  had by this time been to search out one of the hidden gems of the Paris culinary circuit, Le Train Bleu, which is basically the station buffet in Gare du Lyon. Beryl Cook painted one of her pictures here, its certainly some buffet.

Our journey home consisted of a two hour Eurostar into St Pancras, a short stroll to Euston and then another two hour into Liverpool. All remarkably easy and something which the introduction of HS2 would be pushed to better .

So it's the sweaties next week in Edinburgh and then Ireland two weeks later in Twickenham, lets hope by then the team has learnt the lessons of Saturday and we are nicely set up for another title decider against the Welsh. More snails anyone?