Earlier that week, after all, we had been told by French Sports Minister Amélie Oudéa-Castéra that the nation had "done a tremendous amount of work to learn the lessons from what happened at the Stade de France" for last year's shambolic men's UEFA Champions League final.

Based on the experience I have heard from friends, family and other fans there supporting Liverpool on that night of May 28 2022, it remains a miracle no one was killed because of incompetent crowd management and violent policing. An independent report commissioned by UEFA found "it is remarkable no one lost their life", while a French Senate report found the Champions League final was a "warning shot" requiring the Government and other relevant bodies to "draw the necessary lessons".

Yet here we are more than one year on, and fans attending a sporting event in France - at another Paris 2024 venue no less - have been put into a dangerous situation.

Fans, some of whom arrived more than an hour before the 9pm local time kick-off, have reported being unable to get inside the Stade Vélodrome before the start of the match. On social media and in various British publications, supporters have testified that the congestion was scary and the organisation of the event extremely poor.

Irish fans attending their opening Rugby World Cup match against Romania in 36 degrees Celsius heat at the Stade de Bordeaux also reported issues accessing another Paris 2024 venue by public transport, long queues to enter the stadium and to buy food and drink, with some vendors running out of water.

Time is running out for France to get this right with the start of next year's Olympics just 10-and-a-half months away. Time is running out for it to instil confidence in visitors, expected to total in the millions, that it can safely host a major sporting event.

Confidence, for me, that it is completing lacking at the moment. Confidence that has been lacking since Oudéa-Castéra, whose Ministerial portfolio also includes the Paris 2024 Olympics and Paralympics, and Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin rode out the storm after their outrageous and sickening lies to the world last year after the Champions League final. Similar lies were made by UEFA, it should be added.

Baseless claims that ticketless supporters were responsible for the chaos at the Stade de France were widely dismissed and have been proven false. In the days after the match, the two Ministers defended the indefensible including the indiscriminate use of tear gas on fans.

Among Darmanin's other lies was "it’s patently only in football with certain English clubs that these events happen". It is tough to provide a restrained response to such falsehoods with grim shades of tropes used as part of an attempted cover-up of the 1989 Hillsborough disaster in Sheffield, when 97 Liverpool supporters were unlawfully killed at an FA Cup semi-final and which shamefully required a brave three-decade campaign for justice.

The reality of what happened at the Stade de France in May last year is it was the restraint of Liverpool supporters in the face of police provocation which averted a disaster.

It is mystifying that after the shambolic handling of the Champions League final and their disgraceful inflammatory comments afterwards that Oudéa-Castéra and Darmanin did not resign or face the sack.

Oudéa-Castéra fronted the pre-Rugby World Cup press conference in which she claimed France's security policy had been revised after the Champions League final, with between 5,500 and 7,000 security personnel mobilised across France and 600 agents recruited.

Yet numbers of police security officials were not what made the Champions League final so unsafe. It was their wholly inappropriate and violent methods deployed on the night, which led to a rebuke in the Senate report, a call for guidelines on the use of tear gas and a change in attitude towards supporters. On top of an inability to manage crowds.

I was sceptical of Oudéa-Castéra's claims to have learned lessons when she made them last week - indeed sceptical of any claims made without meaningful changes at the very top. The early results from the Rugby World Cup have not been promising.

World Rugby has apologised for fans' experience in Marseille at the weekend and vowed to take steps to improve access for the remainder of the tournament.

Organising Committee President Jacques Rivoal did likewise today and acknowledged it was "our responsibility", while tournament director Michel Pousseau claimed "we are very confident" issues can be addressed.

Measures planned include redeploying volunteers in Marseille.

The Rugby World Cup is a lengthy tournament set to be held until October 28 across nine French cities, but any hopes the first round of matches could ease the pressure on France and provide an emphatic response to questions over its ability to stage major sporting events with the Olympics and Paralympics nearing lay in tatters after the chaos of Marseille.