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Les Bleus were clearly on an upward path after their 29-5 defeat against England a month ago, beating finalists South Africa 17-8 and Scotland 11-6 in the group stages and reaching the fifth place play-off with a 25-13 win over Samoa.
But they were handed the initiative early on in this game as England made a sluggish start and a couple of defensive errors contributed to two tries in the opening 10 minutes.
A gap opened up for fly-half Mathieu Belie to strike in the second minute and flanker Laurent Thuery pounced when England overthrew the ball five metres from their line.
Belie’s two conversions made it 14-0 before England settled and enjoyed their best spell, Greendale going close and the forwards held up before Tait cut back close to the base of a five metre scrum to force his way over 22 minutes into the game.
Bastareaud restored the 14-point advantage when breaking tackles from close range under the posts for Belie to convert against the run of play.
Bolt gave his side some hope just before the break, though, with a solo score after chipping over the base of a ruck and reclaiming the ball to score after the bounce bewitched a trio of defenders.
Despite making major changes at half-time – with three front-row replacements sent on and Joe Simpson taking over at scrum-half – their chances evaporated in the first 10 minutes of the second half.
Within two minutes Bastareaud had plundered a second score after another gap opened up in front of Belie and England were reduced to 14 men when Ben Thomas was sin-binned for stamping.
Losing the ball going forward gave Camara the chance to race 50 metres to score and Belie’s fourth conversion was followed by a penalty that put the French out of sight.
England didn’t lie down and five minutes from time Simpson added some respectability to the scoreline with a fine try under the posts that Greendale converted.
France weren’t finished either, though, with Thuery adding a second try when England were hustled into another mistake on their own put-in on their own line.
England: David Smith (Northampton Saints); Miles Benjamin (Worcester Warriors), Alex Tait (Newcastle Falcons), Gareth Griffiths (Bristol Rugby; Greg King, Worcester Warriors & Hartpury College, 62), Noah Cato (Saracens); Adam Greendale (Leeds Tykes & Hymers College), Richard Bolt (Exeter Chiefs; Joe Simpson, London Wasps 36); Jack Steadman (Bristol Rugby; Billy Moss, Bath Rugby 36), Scott Freer (Leeds Tykes; Joe Williams, Cinderford, 36), Alex Corbisiero (London Irish; Nathan Catt, Bath Rugby 36), Ben Thomas (Saracens; Tom Denton, Leeds Tykes 50), Matthew Cox (Worcester Warriors; Gregor Gillanders, Leicester Tigers, 14), Jon Fisher (London Irish & Wellington College), Andy Saull (Saracens & Bancrofts School; Garth Dew (Sale Sharks, temp 60-70), Hugo Ellis (captain, London Wasps).
Replacements (not used): Danny Pointon (Northampton Saints), Tom Bedford (Exeter Chiefs), Tom Lozides (Saracens).
France: Cedric Coll; Erwan Berot, Mathieu Bastareaud, Yann David, Djibril Camara; Mathieu Belie, Morgan Parra (captain); Raphael Olive, Antonin Raffault, Nicolas Agnesi, Yoann Maestri, Jean Roidot, Laurent Thuery, Yohan Vivalda, Raphael Lakafia.
Replacements: Jordan Merle, Clement Ric, Arthur Joly, Antoine Loubiere, Vincent Mehn, Charles Gimenez, Adrien Tomas, Maxime Machenaud, Bastien Fitte, Adam Jaulhac, Louis Madaule.
Referee: David Keane (IRFU).
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