Mêlée spontanée - les mains loin!

Pity the poor French rugby referee who - thanks to the demands of the French language police - will now, presumably, have to shout out the above tongue twister (eight syllables) instead of the rather more direct "ruck - hands away" (three) that we are used to.

This is one little gem to be found in the French government's response to the World Cup - Ballon ovale… Prêts pour la mêlée ? - a guide to the "correct" French words to be used when talking or writing about rugby.

Other interesting French words for English rugby terminology include raffut for
"hand-off" - an odd choice for a word that normally means "racket" (as in the sense of a loud noise or argument - hullabaloo would be another equivalent). Indeed you wonder how much the French government's language experts know about the game as they kindly give us French translations for "goal average", "sparring partner" and "time-out" but nothing at all for "maul", "scrum/scrummage", or "bottle" (in the sense of the verb describing what New Zealand men's rugby teams normally do).

Even so - much here to impress a teacher or examiner for anyone who is doing GCSE French!