Sixty minutes into our European Cup home game against Leicester and English prop Graham Rowntree is unhappy. 'Ah, fuck, ref! That prick just eye-gouged me!' The referee is Italian, and doesn't seem to understand. The accused is French and does. He is vigorously denying the charge. I am standing next to another New Zealander, who just laughs and says: 'Welcome to France.'

My own introduction to the niceties of French club rugby had come a few years earlier. I'd always heard that the game there is a little different, but it wasn't until I got on the pitch that I realised how different. I had arrived in Paris in 1997 to play for Racing Club de France, after a difficult season with Wellington in the New Zealand National Provincial Championship. As far as I was concerned, I would be playing relaxed open rugby and earning a bit of cash, with time on my hands for some in-depth cultural tourism.

While the club organised my professional licence I was to have a run out with the second team at Dijon. The game was billed as a match amicale. As we were getting changed, I noticed some of my new team-mates were putting on what looked like cricket boxes. Why the hell would anyone need a box for a rugby game? Ask a silly question...

The game was slow and error-ridden, but that wasn't what worried me. I was just happy to get off the field alive. As it was, my nose was smeared across my face in the second minute, and my starry-eyed image of 'French flair' underwent a rapid reassessment.

At one point, a lineout on one side of the field turned into a brawl among the forwards which spilled into the crowd. The ball had somehow made it out to the opposite wing and ended up in touch, where the backs were sorting out a disagreement of their own. And you didn't have to be wearing a jersey to get involved - some of the supporters were weighing in with an umbrella or a gumboot. The only people left on the field of play were the other side's resident New Zealander and me. We didn't know whether to laugh, cry, or start punching each other.

The more I played the more fascinated I became by provincial French rugby and its customs and traditions. It was only by understanding some of the history, it seemed to me, that you could make sense of the extraordinary goings-on on the pitch.

The game arrived in France in 1872, when English merchants set up a club in Le Havre, and from there it was taken up in Paris by students and the bourgeoisie. But the South quickly became the rugby heartland, and has remained so - 15 of the 16 teams in what is now the first division come from the lower half of the French hexagon, the exception being the Parisians of Stade Fran¿ais. A sport that channelled age-old rivalries between towns and villages into a physical contest caught the imagination of a people whose public sporting entertainments until now had been limited to bullfighting (even today, during the slow summer months, the rugby weekly Midi Olympique fills out its pages with bullfighting reports).

The local team became the town's flag bearer, a tangible indication of their virility, intelligence and skill. Status could be measured by a team's performance; and it gave smaller towns the opportunity to put one over on the big cities. While an Englishman typically learnt his rugby at school, in France a player would pull on his club jersey right from the very beginning of his career, when the duty of upholding the club's identity would be impressed upon him. All this gave rise to a peculiarly Gallic phenomenon - what the French call l'esprit de clocher. My dictionary bluntly defines this as 'parochialism', but the sense is more romantic. Literally, a clocher is the church's clock tower. Symbolically, it stood for everything a good Frenchman held close to his heart - family, friends, religion; the roots of his existence. A home game meant that a team was entrusted with defending this cultural identity against the visitors - the invaders - and everyone was watching. Rugby's nature as a contact sport meant that inferior skills needn't get in the way of a victory. A lesser side might lose by 40 points on an away game: the same team playing according to the same rules (although referees have never been entirely ignorant of expectations) would sweat blood - and perhaps spill a bit - to grind out a 6-3 win at home. Even today, an away win is considered remarkable.

As a player, this passion for rugby is something I cherish, but it does have its flip side. Two years ago, when Racing were relegated from the first division, I moved to Perpignan, the principal town of French Catalonia. Paris is so big that, off the field, a player is anonymous. With a population of just over 100,000, Perpignan is more like a village. The result is that, even off the field, you are being watched: three nights before one game I had a few beers with some friends. When I arrived at training the next morning everyone asked about my evening in the pub - a supporter had taken it upon himself to let everyone know about my penchant for Guinness via the club website.

On the whole, though, I have been lucky: in the two seasons that I have been here, the club has been successful, and the public are appreciative. I had a taste of how things might be if we started to slip when I found a note on my car after a heavy loss in Paris to Stade Fran¿ais. 'You should be ashamed. Where is your pride? What must the Catalans who live in Paris have thought?'

A bit of niggle is an occupational hazard for rugby players. Everyone has his own approach to taking it or dishing it out. Back in New Zealand, my coach's mantra was: 'Take the smack in the mouth, put your hands in your pockets, and take the three points.' Even if it relies on the referee spotting the bastard that clipped you, it's a good rule. In any case, the theory goes, a good player shouldn't be intimidated by dirty play, only more determined to win.

Things are a little different here, as I was to see in one of my first championship matches. From the kick-off, an opponent ran straight for our South African lock and, with a 15-yard run-up, hit him so hard that all 18 stone of Afrikaner policeman fell over. The ball had landed miles away and the ref was obliged to get his red card out. As far as I was concerned, the whole affair was quite satisfactory: it wasn't me that had been lamped, our bloke got up anyway, they had to play a man down for the rest of the game and we went on to win easily. The club president, a former international, was waiting for us in the changing room. His reaction was not what I had expected: my French wasn't up to the torrent that he let fly, but anyone could see he wasn't happy. When I asked why, I was told that he didn't care whether any of our lot were sent off, but anyone who did that to one of our players should leave the field on a stretcher.

New Zealand has a reputation of its own as far as 'uncompromising' rugby goes, and not without some justification. David Kirk, the World Cup-winning All Black captain, was the coach when I first played for Wellington: after we lost one game, he told us: 'I never hit anyone when I was playing, but I was bloody glad some people in front of me did. And that's what some of you will have to do if we want to really dominate other teams.' But that was 1994. The advent of professionalism and the ubiquity of television cameras has made ritual blood-letting a thing of the past, certainly at the highest level, in New Zealand. The big hits that now come with offensive tackling and old-fashioned rucking mean that you still get battered, but it's all above board. These days, the emphasis is more on sacrifice - pre-match, the talk is typically of putting your body on the line for the team. The night before playing for New Zealand under-21s against Australia, for instance, one of our players said to the team: 'Guys, if we have to go out there tomorrow and die for the jersey, then that's what we have to do.' (At the time, I have to admit, I had to stop myself laughing - but then he went on to become an All Black, and I didn't.)

In France, though, it's the old habits that die hard. The talk in the changing room remains aggressive - Ça va être la guerre! - and revolves around what we need to do to the other lot. I have often asked myself what goes through the heads of some French players. Rugby is a contact sport - tension is inevitable and, in the professional era, money raises the stakes - but most rugby players would agree that there are certain unwritten rules. During a game, if you really want to hurt someone, you have plenty of opportunities: some legal, some less so. If someone's trying it on - a push in a lineout, a tug on the jersey in the chase for the loose ball - they shouldn't be too surprised to receive a little discouragement. But you don't do anything that might cause permanent damage. There are two reasons for this: first, the fact of mutually assured destruction. If you start, there is a good chance one of your victim's mates will do the same to you. Second, even if it sounds a bit corny, there is a bond of trust that exists which stems from a mutual respect.

But I sometimes wonder whether I'm deluding myself. I once saw a teammate knee an opponent in the head. I imagined that it was, at the very least, retaliation. After the game I asked him why he'd done it. He looked surprised and said: 'C'«etait gratuit' (Why not?)

There is no doubt that the French club competition has a higher tolerance for the kind of violence that would be heavily sanctioned elsewhere. In 1998, Richard Nones, a prop from Colomiers, was suspended for two years by the European Board after being sent off for eye-gouging in a Heineken Cup game against Pontypridd. He appealed on the grounds that he was innocent, and that the touch judge who claimed to have seen the offence was mistaken, but the subtext was that it was ludicrous to suspend anyone from their job for two years for such a banal crime. I don't know whether or not he was guilty, but the year before I had found myself on the wrong side of a ruck with a finger in my eye - right in front of the referee, who blew his whistle and awarded a penalty against the owner of the offending digit. A penalty. Not a two-year suspension.

It's not that the French Federation of Rugby (FFR) sets out to be lax - the punishment laid down for gouging is a six-month suspension. But the French have always had a habit of free interpretation when it comes to laws which they feel don't fit in with their cultural heritage. You only need to ask for the obligatory non-smoking table in a Paris restaurant and find yourself sitting in the toilets to work that out.

The traditional way of coping with a referee's slack attitude towards violence is, of course, more violence. And the attitude here is summed up in the language: in English, we talk about someone retaliating. In French rugby, he would be referred to as un justicier, an upholder of the law, a bringer of justice. As far as I can tell, there isn't any irony involved. (In the same vein, fair play is tellingly known as 'le fair-play' - an imported concept)

Again, the FFR has set down guidelines to discourage this kind of thing. The problem is implementing a law that runs counter to what many consider to be the spirit of the game.

A couple of years ago the FFR decided a crackdown was overdue, and players were warned that taking the law into their own hands would lead to a red card. In typically cock-eyed fashion, the original offender would get a yellow card, while the justicier was to be sent off. In practice, referees just didn't have the heart for it.

A few weeks after this policy was announced, I had a close-up look at it in action. One of our players was kicked, and, as I was standing next to the man with the frisky boots, I felt honour-bound to have a swat at him. The referee witnessed the whole incident and we were both called over. Both sides had been reminded about the new ruling, so I was gearing myself up to be first in the shower when the yellow card came out for the original offender. The referee turned to me. 'You shouldn't have punched him. But,' he said, with a shrug of the shoulders, 'it was a reflex action and I understand. But you must not do it again!'

The problem with this laissez faire attitude is that players grow accustomed to certain interpretations with their clubs, only to have Anglo-Saxon referees employ the letter of the law when they play international games. French indiscipline, as is so often the case, comes from an excess of enthusiasm, which sounds laudable but can be costly: Jean-Claude Skrela, the coach who took France to two Grand Slams and the World Cup Final in 1999, used to say that his team started out any international match 9-0 down because of the inevitable penalty count.

The strength of French rugby has often been its downfall - a tendency to think of itself more in terms of an art than a science: instinctive, visceral, bloody-minded, rooted in tradition, not the product of a laboratory. But these days, most teams, including Bernard Laporte's national side, are trying to turn rugby into a science. Professionalism has led to an increased use of statistics, video analysis, fitness work; an international side comes with number-crunchers attached.

There are signs that a marriage of these two opposites might be working in France. If Australia, New Zealand and South Africa have led the way over the past decade, their autumn tours to the Northern Hemisphere (France beat Australia 14-13 and won 20-10 against South Africa) proved that the gap has been closed. The Super 12 competition (involving the 12 best club teams from South Africa, Australia and New Zealand) might be high impact, full of running rugby and generally very sexy as far as audiences go, but it may not be the ideal preparation for the international stage.

Lawrence Dallaglio recently talked about the importance of physical intimidation in breaking down an opposition, and the French have proved themselves to be masters of that game. The fact is that, as far as international rugby goes, violence is indiscipline only if you get caught. Critics in New Zealand, for example, have bemoaned the lack of 'hard' forwards for some years now, particularly since the loss to France in the semi-final of the 1999 World Cup, when mutterings were heard from the All Black camp about having been beaten up off the ball.

But whatever their progress in terms of international results, the French still think there is a conspiracy against them. They always will. Anglo-Saxon referees tend to interpret rules differently, and the reason as far as the French are concerned, is that a Welshman will favour an Englishman because they both speak English. Trying to explain that this might not be the case is useless.

But the French rugby player doesn't hate his English counterpart, even if losing to him is the stuff of nightmares. There is a particular respect for English discipline - balanced by the feeling that the English are predictable and innately, well, dull. Even the best English teams play according to a set pattern, with little room for inspiration, whereas the French pride themselves on their unpredictability - the stereotypically sturdy English as opposed to the guile and art of the French - though this looks increasingly like a myth. The fact that the English are now playing disciplined rugby that is also inventive has been a source of some irritation. Of course, the French would never base their game on an English model, but they're not afraid to adopt one or two ideas from across the Channel (the defensive coach of the national side is now an Englishman from rugby league, Dave Ellis.)

There is a tendency to equate what the English think of as sportsmanship with a lack of passion: when Perpignan lost 54-15 to Leicester at Welford Road, our kicker couldn't get over the fact that the capacity crowd let him take all of his attempts at goal in a cathedral-like silence. None of the usual whistling, booing and firecrackers. And they clapped politely when we scored, instead of screaming at the referee!

Unlike New Zealand, where the whole point of internal competition is to produce a good All Black side, French club rugby is the lifeblood of the sport in France to such an extent that, even if it doesn't affect the national side itself, support from the spectators at the Stade de France feels splintered in comparison to the fervour displayed in the more intimate settings of the clubs.

Club supporters like to think of themselves as the sixteenth man, capable of influencing the course of the game. At Perpignan, we let the other team run out first and soak up the insults from the terraces. I've played in front of bigger crowds than the 12,000 that squeeze into Stade Aime Giral, but they've never made the hairs stand up on the back of my neck the way the roar of the crowd does here.