AVF St. Patrick's Day Party

It was sunny today in Lyon but the wind continues to whip through the landscape making ambling about the old city a bit daunting.

Actually, the Falcons

are pretty good on Defense 

We've only surrendered 20 points in our five games.

Chimneys surrounding Place Bellecour

It was Thursday, so I met Mary Robinson Hubert as usual for the weekly AVF club meeting in Vieux Lyon.

 Sleek New Taxi?

Flesh Eating Plants For Sale

in Vieux Lyon

This store had lots of different varieties of these hungry little plants.

"Feed me, Seymour!"

 Cacao Beans

The Basis for Chocolate

 AVF Reception Area Today

What the . . .

Oh, that's right, it was an early

St. Patrick's Day motiff today

Wear Green or Get Pinched!

Rich Goodies as always!

Making Coffee . . .

. . . IRISH Coffee

This may have been a short cut but it still tasted darn good.

Adding the Final Touches

Scones with Jam hit the spot as well

After consuming way to many goodies, I was off to wander the rues in search of authentic Lyonnais street scenes.

Setting Up for the Lunch Crowd

Scarves For Sale 

A Vieux Porte in Vieux Lyon

Business Signs are always of interest

It should be St. James' not

St. James's I do believe

A Bouchon Specializes in Pork Cuisine

Another Good Looking Restaurant 

A Wine Shop

A Beauty Salon

Self-Explanatory 

A School for Boys

Lots of Bouchons in Lyon 

Dairy Products 

 Yellow was BIG Today

As was Red . . .

. . . See

Too Cold to Eat Outdoors . . .

 . . . But the Place Settings were Nice

 Enticing

Rue de Boeuf translates to Beef Street

The bull statue up above was to help illiterate people in the middle ages to know where they were.

 Colorful Courtyards

Corner Brick Work

 As I said, Red was an IN Color Today

Latin I'm Sure

Headless in Lyon

 Guignol Puppets are a Tradition in Lyon

BEAUTIFUL Place St-Paul

Oh yes, it WAS windy today!

No, I don't get tired of this Fountain

Chez Jackie Yesterday

I forgot to post this from lunch yesterday, I enjoy my weekly meal at Chez Jackie's quite a lot.

One last Senior team (5-0) practice tonight before our game in Chambéry against the Aigles (1-2) on Sunday. We'll need a good one to compete with an improving squad in only three days.

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, I'll be off to Aix-en-Provence on Friday where I will have lunch with Gabriel Maginier, the Head Coach of the Aix-en-Provence Argonautes Junior team.

A hearty "Merci" to Olivier Rival who set up this meeting. Olivier edits the wonderful Elitefoot.com website that gives you all of the information that you could possibly want on any and all things about American football in France.

TRAVEL FRIDAY HERE I COME!!!

Cold Wednesday

Winter returned to Lyon today with cold weather, winds and a snowflake or two.

I did get into Lyon today to dine at Chez Jackie. They served a delicious Lyonnais speciality, Andouillette sausage. It was spectacular!

In preparation for my Travel Friday adventure, I purchased a round-trip train ticket to the lovely city of Aix-en-Provence today at Gare Part-Dieu. If any one has tips about this interesting destination, I would love to hear them.

In the evening we had our usual Cadet and Junior practices in some unusual conditions.

Coach Bastiand bundled up

during Cadet tackling practice

My Weather Channel app said that the temperature was 32ºF/0ºC but that the wind chill made it feel more like 20ºF/-7ºC!!!

We had two good sessions despite the weather. I hope that we can have a similar workout with our Senior team Thursday night.

Two Days of Film Study

I spent most of Monday and Tuesday at The Villa breaking down our Falcons game videos of first last Saturday night's Clermont-Ferrand Servals game and then of our our skirmish against the Lyon Gones two weeks ago.

We failed to film our game with Lyon but the Gones were good enough to let us have a copy of their tape to review. 

MERCI Gones!!!

Once the breakdown of our two games was finished, it was then time to start looking at videos of our next opponent, the Chambéry Aigles.

Junior Practice on Monday Night

The Juniors (1-0) play only their second game of the season at home on Sunday against the two time defending National Champion Thonon Les Bains Black Panthers.

A tough assignment to say the very least.

5-0 Seniors play on the road this Sunday

We had a very physical practice tonight with our defense in rare practice form, they brought the hat tonight to be sure!

This weekend, we play an away game against the Chambéry Aigles squad that we edged 18-0 last November 25th. The Aigles are currently 1-2 having had two games postponed because of bad weather. With the end of the regular season scheduled for April 14th, the squad from Chambéry is going to be quite busy the next five weekends.

I've got to get outdoors on Wednesday.

New Pictures from the Falcons-Servals Game

I was excited to get the following photos from the Falcons game in Clermont-Ferrand via Facebook from Falcons up and coming DT Mathieu Phalaris and from photographer Florian Martinez.

MERCI!!!

 The Defense played SO well!!!

Will the entire DL please get in a stance.

Remi Laurencon and Pierre Bouysset

racing for a QB Sack off the edge

 Good Stances

Another Falcon QB Sack

BON NUI!!!

 VDR Sets . . .

The offense was excellent as well Saturday night. QB John van den Raadt had his best game to date throwing three TD passes in the first half. He only played in part of the first series of the second half before being replaced by backups Mathieu Paredes and Bruno Chapuis. 

. . . Throws . . .

. . . and Follows Through,

the Result . . .

 . . . TOUCHDOWN Gaetan Tafa!!!

 WR Pierro Theyssier played GREAT!!!

VDR Scrambling 

Bruno Chapuis TD pass to Wahid Larbi

Brice Rontet for Two Points

Brice is our holder on PATs and had trouble handling the snap on this attempt but made a "FIRE" call and ran it in himself.

Brice Rontet's

Dying Cockroach Block on the left

 WARRIOR!!!

Oh to some day have an entire team with Brice's attitude, skills and desire . . .

Meanwhile, in St-Étienne . . .

One of France's most, shall we say,

experienced Division IV Linebackers