France v Ireland Yannick NyangaYou don't have to spend too long in Yannick Nyanga's company to appreciate why he is such an emerging star of French rugby. In tandem with the athleticism and dynamism this pacy flanker brings to the game, he is a bright, engaging 22-year-old who has been an articulate spokesperson against racism and has a decent command of English and a certain charm about him.
There is a certain charm to his story too. Born in Kinshasa, he came to France from Zaire with his parents when he was only one. He started playing when he was five, "because my house was very close to the rugby field. I didn't know this sport and neither did my father, but every Wednesday my father would see these children running around in the field and he wanted me to have a sports activity, so I go there just to make friends."
Football would have had a more natural pull on a young African boy growing up in Beziers. "But I didn't want to go to football because I didn't want to leave my friends. I didn't want this sport (rugby) so much, but I made a lot of friends in rugby, so I stayed and played this game."
His father, he admits, is as surprised as he is proud of what his son has achieved. "Yes, but me too. When I think where I came from and what I do now, it's crazy."
Born to run with the ball, it seems, he brings so much more than that to his game, not least his agility in lineouts. "I like running with the ball but I like to defend too. I try now to be a complete player."
To that end, after five years at Beziers, his move to Toulouse was tailor-made to maximise his huge talent. "It was very different to come to Toulouse, the European champion club. A lot of things are different in Toulouse. We always play for the win, it is a big game every week and you can win 10 times in a row but then you lose one time, and it is a disaster.
"So I learn how to prepare properly for every game, and training with Fabien Pelous and Frederic Michalak I learn a lot every day. Fabien has great experience and for the forward game he is a great leader."
Michalak, he admits with a knowing chuckle, is a mercurial talent. "You don't know where he will go, so you have to stay behind him and follow him, and one time he will give you the ball. He is a great player."
He already has something of an insight into the Irish psyche, courtesy of Trevor Brennan.
"He is a very good player. He is powerful and gives a lot of himself on the field, and that's why everybody who plays with him really enjoys it. He's very different on the field and in life. On the field he is a warrior, and in the life he's the best man you can have.
"He's always helpful, always very happy, always smiling and he always has a good word for the team when the team is angry - the good words to make the team happy. A very precious man."
Nyanga also gives an insight into the recriminatory and redemptory mood within the French squad after their curiously under-par performance in Murrayfield.
"I think the Scottish team gave us a lesson in humility because we did not do the main things to win an international game, I mean 'aggressivity' and a lot of pressure in defence. We just focused on the way we will play, the pass we have to do, where we have to go."
He talks of the fighting Irish spirit, rating them alongside England as Six Nations title contenders, of Paul O'Connell, "a powerful player and a leader", the Stringer-O'Gara axis and especially the latter's range of kicking, and, of course, Brian O'Driscoll and Gordon D'Arcy.
"Brian has been injured for a long time so he is very hungry for the ball and to play, so I think he will be very, very dangerous, but I think it would be a mistake to only be focused on O'Driscoll. All the players are dangerous, Geordan Murphy, Shane Horgan, they have a lot of big players so if we want to win this Saturday we have to make a great game."
