Les Bleues open a series of three warm-up matches against Lauren Jackson's Australia

Ahead of the World Cup, the France team will proceed, this Friday, to a first test against Australia and Lauren Jackson, author of an astonishing comeback.

In 2000, the French women’s team met at the Sydney Olympics with a 19-year-old Australian, Lauren Jackson. Les Bleues of the 2022 generation will find the Opals on their way during a preparation match, this Friday at 12 p.m., with still the same young woman at the pivot, twenty-two years later.

Coach Sandy Brondello, 54, played several times with Lauren Jackson, now 41, with the national team, and also in the WNBA with the Seattle Storm in 2003.

“Lauren is my friend,” Brondello told ESPN. “I kind of took her under my wing when she was 16 at her first World Cup in 1998, we have mutual respect, but to think that so many years later I’m now her coach, it makes me feel weird. »

The Opals coach certifies that she does not treat Lauren Jackson in a special way since she returned to competition and with the national team, after six years of absence and two babies.

“Lauren is just another player that I’m trying to help be the best in the system that we have. I don’t know if Lauren thinks that’s weird. If I get mad at her, I call her Lauren, not ‘Loz’ if I need to get my point across,” she laughs.

Jackson underwent an extensive fitness review to assess her current ability to withstand a grueling World Cup schedule of up to 8 matches in 10 days.

“We had to make sure we were doing it the right way. We just couldn’t trust Lauren Jackson because of her name. The performance staff built a fitness element for her to absorb, and Lauren was able to pull it off. She changed her training, we don’t do more than three days in a row, but she reacted pretty well and performed pretty well. She won’t be the Lauren of 10 years ago, but the Lauren she is now is always going to be very beneficial to our overall game. I think people are going to be quite surprised at how Lauren is able to perform after being away for so long. »

Sandy Brondello is happy with the preparations for the tournament, with a training camp in New York at the end of July allowing the New York Liberty head coach to spend time with the team amid a busy WNBA schedule.

The visit of Patty Mills

The Opals were also surprised by a visit from Boomers star Patty Mills, the Brooklyn Nets point guard, who spent time with the team.

“I’ve known Patty for a little while, I don’t know him very well, but I admire what he’s done. I just asked him if he could come and talk about his experiences with what the Boomers have done and the development they have and the culture that allowed them to win their first medal (Editor’s note: at the Tokyo Olympics). The players didn’t know he was coming, I wanted to keep it as a surprise. He’s someone we all look up to and we listened to his story which really inspired me too. Having him spend 90 minutes with us was really special for the players, many of them had never met Patty before and he spent time, he spent more than I asked of him. We were very grateful for that and it says a lot about Patty, not just as a basketball player, but as a human being. »

For the Australians as for the French, this preparation match will illuminate their landscape a few days before the World Cup. In particular, we will know if Lauren Jackson is still a superwoman.

The preparation program of Les Bleues:

France – Australia: Friday, September 16, 12:30 p.m. (French time)

France – Japan: Sunday, September 18, 6:00 a.m.

France – United States: Monday, September 19, 8:00 a.m.

2022 World Cup – Sydney (Australia) – September 22 to October 1e

Thursday September 22 at 12:30 p.m.: Australia-France
Friday September 23 at 10 a.m.: France-Canada
Sunday September 25 at 6:30 a.m.: Mali-France
Monday September 26 at 8 a.m.: France-Japan
Tuesday 27 September at 9.30 a.m.: Serbia-France
Thursday, September 29: Quarter-finals
Friday, September 30: Semi-final
Saturday, October 1: Final
*French time