WALES V FRANCE (Saturday KO 2.45)

CAPTAIN and world class openside flanker Sam Warburton has been hailed as the “king of the contact area” who could tip the balance in Wales’ favour against France.

That’s the view of former Wales great Mark Ring who believes Warburton is in the same class as All Blacks legend and World Cup winning skipper Richie McCaw.

Cross Keys attack and Newport Gwent Dragons junior academy coach Ring believes Warburton and McCaw are “light years ahead” of their peers.

The ex-Wales centre and outside-half is not the only one hoping Warburton will be fit for the Grand Slam decider.

And Wales remain confident their inspirational skipper will recover in time for the showdown after missing the 24-3 victory over Italy in Cardiff last weekend.

Ring was an important member of Wales’ 1988 Triple Crown winning side and thinks the class of 2012 will go one better and win the Grand Slam after his generation fell agonisingly short by 10-9 to France in Cardiff in the final game.

“I think Wales go into this weekend’s game with a lot of confidence and France don’t hold any fears for them,” the ex-Pontypool and Cardiff ace said.

But Ring believes Les Bleus still pose a significant threat.

“I think our main worry is that France will come here with nothing to lose and play total rugby,” he said.

“But my advice to Wales would be, stay composed and play the game in the right areas and take them on up front.

“Every match is won up front and you can’t play without the ball.”

On Warburton, Ring said: “Fingers crossed he is fit because he makes a huge difference and is the king of the contact area – he and Richie McCaw are light years ahead.”

Ring believes Wales have to learn from last Saturday’s lacklustre victory over Italy.

“We were rudderless in attack against them,” he said.

“If France are as well organised in defence as Italy were, they will be far more potent on the turnover.

“The Italians were ‘busting and fanning’. Some people were blaming (outside-half) Rhys Priestland but it wasn’t his fault.

“Wales were playing from side to side.

“They needed someone to break through the middle of the rucks and get beyond the opposition.

“Wales also need to improve their attacking kicking game – I’d like to see them kicking more over the top.”

And on that narrow loss to France, 24 years ago, Ring admitted: “That defeat to France still hurts – it’s in the top three disappointing moments of my rugby career.

“We played a great brand of rugby to win the Triple Crown that year and confidence was sky high going into the France match but we were unfortunate in that Grand Slam game.

“We got off to a great start in our victory away at Twickenham playing with four outside-halves in Jonathan Davies at fly-half, me and Bleddyn Bowen in the centre and Tony Clement at full back.

“And we’d shown great team spirit to beat Ireland, Paul Thorburn kicking a last-minute penalty to give us a win in a hostile atmosphere.

“But the French adapted so much better to the terrible wet conditions than us because the weather was horrendous that day.”