Former All Blacks captain Graham Mourie once told me there are two things you can predict about the French when it comes to rugby. They will be physical - and unpredictable.
Ah, those were the days.
In Mourie's 21 Tests he played France six times and lost to them twice. The 66 per cent win rate is well below the 76 per cent rate from the All Blacks' 56 Tests against France.
The issue with France is that they've beaten the All Blacks in dramatic fashion twice at World Cups, and that sticks in the craw. They also gave the All Blacks one heck of a scare in the 2011 final, or as Sir Graham Henry says "we smashed France by a point".
At last year's World Cup the All Blacks thrashed France 62-13 with a performance that put any ghosts of 2007 back in the dusty cupboard of French success.
In recent years the door on that cupboard has seldom creaked open as France have been the All Blacks' whipping boys.
In the past 20 Tests they've beaten France 17 times. The two defeats were in Dunedin in 2009 and the 2007 World Cup quarterfinal in Cardiff. They also drew in Paris in 2002. Since the 2011 World Cup final the All Blacks have played France five times for five wins, scoring three times as many points as France in the process.
Little suggests Sunday's test in Paris will be any different.
France were ordinary in the Six Nations with just two wins against Italy (by two points) and Ireland (by just one). The club game in France is wreaking havoc on the test team with the flood of foreign players effectively ruling French players out of contending for their national side.
It's ridiculous, but when you allow clubs to run the roost that's what happens.
French rugby fans are pessimists when it comes to playing the All Blacks and few will be giving them much of a chance this week. They thrashed Samoa two weeks ago and then lost by two points to the Wallabies last week. Former French midfielder Tony Marsh, who is a born and bred New Zealander, says if they'd won that match they might have had the confidence needed to beat the All Blacks.
But then, as a mate said to me earlier this week, "the French worry me".
Yes, that, at least, has never changed.
