Ronnie plays the perfect clown

His French portrayal as a crazed cross between John Bull and Buster Keaton cannot disguise the fact that after four years England, under their Cornish colossus Phil Vickery, are back as a credible Six Nations force even if it meant doing Wales another mighty favour of nudging them closer to the RBS title.

By daring to attack Regan on and off the pitch, France unwittingly vindicated Brian Ashton's loyal refusal to cart the oldest runner in the championship off to the knacker's yard.

France head coach Marc Lievremont's condemnation of the Bristol hooker's role in the second Red Rose win here in four months was also a tacit admission that the mischief maker-in-chief had done the agent provocateur bit to perfection.

Lievremont said: 'We really didn't appreciate the behaviour of the English hooker. His behaviour was completely unacceptable at times, very provocative, like a grotesque clown.'

Regan, nicknamed 'Ronnie' as in the late Ronald Reagan, has been in the eye of a few storms down the years but rarely can any noise have been sweeter music to his ears than the cascade of Gallic abuse ringing down around him at his second-half substitution.

'To get booed off like that is something I take as a massive compliment,' he said, his face still bathed in beads of sweat at midnight. 'The whole of France hated me. I can't come here on holiday. Come to think of it, I can't go to Australia either, but that's the price you pay for doing your job. I'm a bit disappointed to be called a clown, but again I take it as a compliment that their coach has got all upset.'

Any poll this morning of those English figures whom the French hate most would have him right up there alongside the Duke of Wellington, Henry V and Brian Moore. Just as the old pitbull used to work the French into a frenzied pre-match lather, so the snarling Regan proved that, even in a more enlightened professional era, they still fall for the old three-card trick.

Dimitri Szarzewski took it hook, line and sinker. The bad blood between Regan and his opposite number flowed during a European Cup tie here last month and the French hooker went into this match complaining about the Bristolian's 'unbearable behaviour'.

'But whatever happens we have to ignore it,' said Szarzewski. 'We cannot allow the team to be punished by losing our cool.'

He failed miserably against a bruiser acclaimed by Ashton as 'an outstanding international hooker and a good scrapper, in the nicest sense of the word'.

When France won a penalty deep inside the English 22 with the match still anybody's for the taking, Szarzewski's failure to resist smashing into Regan left referee Steve Walsh no option but to reverse the penalty. How unacceptable was that given Lievremont's railing at the other hooker's 'unacceptable behaviour'?

'What did I actually do to upset them apart from be my usual self?' said Regan, conveniently ignoring the fact that he had angered the crowd and the opposition in equal measure by taking his time throwing the ball into the line-out, especially the one straight after someone trod on his hand. 'We didn't do it on purpose, slowing down the lineout,' he said. 'It was a matter of making sure we got the calls right and everyone understood. There was no point in rushing. We played at our pace on our ball.'

They still lost three throws and while his understudy Lee Mears cannot be denied a starting place much longer, Regan's value as Mr Motivator extended beyond distracting the French.

He also revved up some of the quieter English souls, stirring Andrew Sheridan in a way which galvanised the whispering giant into doing to the French scrum roughly what he has done repeatedly to Australia's.

England had only five put-ins all night, France conceding penalties from each of the first four. Regan said: 'Big Ted's a massive workhorse but he's got to be wound up and I'm in there to get him all sorted. Andrew needs a kick up the backside before the game to get him into the frame of mind so he performs like that. You get the emotion going and then you know he's going to give a Big Ted performance.

'We'd lost the edge we had at the World Cup but we've got it back now. That was a f****** big effort because nobody gave us a hope in hell. The championship would have been over if we'd lost. Now we're still there with a sniff.'

England's rediscovery of their old selves ensured that the French paid for their tactical naivety, not simply by trying to run the ball from everywhere instead of kicking it as they did in the semi-final, but also in thinking they could get away without a specialist place-kicker.

Damien Traille missed two midrange penalties to obliterate England's six-point interval lead.

England's defensive organisation kept the French strikeforce running in ever-decreasing circles without the glimmer of a try between them, Jonny Wilkinson made a mockery of those who questioned him as a fading light and even Lesley Vainikolo got the ball in his hands more than once.

As for Regan, he strode off into the night, shoulders back, chest out, like an old soldier who had just won the Legion d'honneur.