France have learned from their painful defeat in November to 14-man South Africa, forwards coach William Servat said on Tuesday, ahead of next week's Six Nations opener.
France went into halftime leading 14-13 against the world champions, whose lock Lood de Jager had been sent off for a dangerous tackle.
But the 14 men ran in three second-half tries, while restricting the hosts to a single penalty, to beat France 32-17.
France went on to beat Fiji and Australia in their other autumn internationals – in which they were missing captain and former world player of the year, Antoine Dupont – but Servat insists that the chastening Springbok loss had helped the team evolve.
"It is certain that the South Africa match did a lot of good for us," the former hooker said.
"We were obviously disappointed with that poor performance, but it also helped us to work hard, to not call everything into question but to reflect and to develop our project in a way that makes us better prepared for the Six Nations."
Head coach Fabien Galthie caused a surprise last week by dropping experienced trio Damian Penaud, Gregory Alldritt and Gael Fickou from his enlarged 42-man pre-tournament squad.
Servat insisted that this did not mean that the country's record try-scorer Penaud, former vice-captain Alldritt or most-capped active player Fickou had been dropped, but that others had been rewarded for strong club form.
"It's important to be fair to everyone in the group," said Servat.
"When we think that some players deserve to take that place, they need to deserve it a little bit more than the older players," he added.
"All the great players of this team began their France journey one day.
"It is important for us to reward them for their hard work and their club performances."
Reigning champions France begin their Six Nations campaign on Thursday next week at home to Ireland with scrum-half Dupont back in the blue jersey for the first time since last year's tournament, when he tore his cruciate knee ligament against the same opponents.