France have won their last nine matches in the championship (last two in the 2003 tournament, all five in 2004 and two this season) and if they beat Wales on Saturday they will be the first country to win ten successive games in the history of the championship (1910-2005).
Wales have scored eight tries in three visits to the Stade de France. They had scored seven tries on their previous eleven visits to Paris at the Parc des Princes and failed to score a try in six of those games.
Wales met France for the first time in 1908. The record so far is: Played 80; Wales 41; France 36; Drawn 3.
France may have won the last three games against Wales, but Wales have won two of their three Six Nations games at Stade de France. Not a bad return when you consider Wales played fifteen times at Parc des Princes and won only three times, in 1911, 1913 and 1975.
Wales won on their first visit to the £270m Stade de France in 1999 (34-33) and also won there in 2001 (43-35).
Gareth Thomas, Gareth Llewellyn and Colin Charvis are the only members of the current squad to have played France at Parc des Princes (1997).
Five of the current Welsh twenty-two have won at Stade de France, while four of the French squad have been on the losing side against Wales in Paris.
New Zealand referee Paul Honiss has been in charge of three Welsh internationals before this weekend and Wales won all three. He was the man in the middle when Wales beat France in Cardiff, 34-23, in the World Cup warm-up match in 1999, the 33-23 victory in Rome in 2001 and the 27-20 home win over Tonga in 2003.
Fabien Pelous will win his ninety-nineth cap on Saturday. If he plays against Ireland he will be only the fifth player to win one hundred caps joining Philippe Sella, David Campese, Jason Leonard and George Gregan.
