You speak as if the devs don’t understand balance. They have a balance team with AoE players for heavens sake.
If they nerfed everything but the French and Rus, but forgot to nerf these two, that would be a very silly error. I’m sure they didn’t forget to just nerf these two.
My theory is that this French overpowering is actually intended. New players will stick around if they can play and win without much skill. New civs always end up like this. But they get balanced out later.