Following the announcement of Fabien Galthie’s team to face Italy, we pick our winners and losers ahead of France’s Six Nations trip to Rome.
The Les Bleus head coach has made sweeping changes to his squad, once again showing his ruthless selection edge.
However, there is a hint of desperation in his calls as he looks to turn the side’s Six Nations campaign around after the loss to England at Allianz Stadium last time out.
France narrowly avoided defeat the last time Galthie’s charges tackled the Azzurri and it’s clear he wants his team to lay down a marker.
Without further ado, here are our winners and losers from the side named for the Six Nations Round Three fixture.
Winners
Leo Barre
After missing the opening two rounds, Leo Barre is thrown right back into the mix as he fills the number 15 jersey. The Stade Francais star was the starting full-back last November and returns as Galthie reinstates the fly-half pecking order from 2024.
The 22-year-old is a brilliant talent and shone last year and despite his club’s struggles this season, he has been a standout.
Théo Attissogbe
His omission from the matchday squad for the Round Two clash was rather harsh considering the fact that he crossed for a pair of tries against Wales.
Théo Attissogbe has yet to let France down when given the opportunity but when Damian Penaud returned, he was always going to return to the starting XV.
However, with Galthie understood to be unhappy with Penaud’s outing against England, more on that later, the 20-year-old has been promoted back into the team. The France boss has not shied away from backing youth during his tenure and Attissogbe is one of the players that has repaid the faith.
Thomas Ramos
It’s worth remembering that Thomas Ramos fell out of favour with the French head coach in 2020 as now he is one of the first names on Galthie’s teamsheet.
Sure he is the first-choice full-back but now Ramos has elevated himself to second place in the fly-half ranking too. The 29-year-old is one of the best placekickers in world rugby and that certainly plays into his favour but his ability to seamlessly shift into the number 10 jersey is a massive asset too.
As mentioned above, Galthie seems desperate with his selections and it’s rather telling that he would rather trust a full-back who can play fly-half in the number 10 jersey than an out-and-out pivot for a crucial fixture. Ramos has certainly earned the trust of his head coach through his performances and his ability to combine with Antoine Dupont and be more direct on attack is bound to make a monumental difference.
Mickaël Guillard
Galthie is contending with somewhat of a locking crisis especially on the tighthead side of the second-row with Paul Willemse looking increasingly unlikely to return to the rugby pitch due to concussion while Posolo Tuilagi is sidelined. Additionally, Emmanuel Meafou misses the clash with the Italians through illness.
Still, the head coach could have opted for a lighter second-row with Alexandre Roumat and Thibaud Flament being proven quality but instead, Galthie has trusted youth again with Mickaël Guillard.
Guillard has quickly become a regular in the squad since making his Test debut against Argentina last year and now gets his first crack in the starting XV.
Anthony Jelonch
Anthony Jelonch has always been held in high regard with Galthie and his coaching team but the head coach has equally always rewarded form during his tenure.
While the back-rower has been a regular call-up, one would not blame the Les Bleus boss for being reluctant to select him considering his injury run of late and sluggish start to the season.
However, Jelonch has reportedly impressed Galthie with his most recent outing with Toulouse in the Top 14 clash against Clermont. His shift not only earned him a recall but a spot on the bench as part of the Le Bomb Squad as he earns his first cap since the World Cup.
Maxime Lucu
The Bordeaux boys are not necessarily in Galthie’s good books at the moment considering the omissions of Penaud and Matthieu Jalibert but Maxime Lucu remains a favourable selection for the coach.
He comes into the matchday squad in the place of Nolann Le Garrec and has been tasked with being the only backline replacement in the 7-1 split.
It’s likely that if there was an injury in the backline that Dupont would shift to the centres or fly-half but Lucu could easily slot into the half-backs and steer the side to victory.
Centres
Galthie has not been shy to swing the axe but the centres have avoided the chop as Yoram Moefana and Pierre-Louis Barassi are retained in the starting positions. This despite the fact that starting XV regular and world-class operator Gael Fickou is fit for the fixture.
Fickou has been excellent at both inside and outside centre for France and would seamlessly slot right back into the run-on team but instead, Galthie has backed the men that did the job in the first two rounds.
It’s a particularly big show of faith for Barassi who only earned his first start for the team in the opening game against Wales. The Toulouse man has been in sterling form of late and again, the French head coach is rewarding that.
Losers
Damian Penaud and Matthieu Jalibert
Two players that did not avoid the chop are Penaud and Jalibert who have been made scapegoats for the Twickenham failure.
Penaud pitched in with a try and an assist against England but according to reports, the winger’s outing left much to be desired on both sides of the ball. The coaching team were not pleased by the speedster’s work ethic in attack as he failed to provide support resulting in three turnovers.
He was described as ‘forgetting himself’ on defence by French media as he made costly lapses including getting wrapped up in the maul before England scored the match-winning try.
On the face of it, Galthie’s decision looks brutally ruthless with the winger making over 90 running metres, beating six defenders and making two clean breaks against England but he also threw two bad passes and missed a whopping five of his seven tackle attempts.
While he excelled in brief flashes on attack and the same was true with his teammate Jalibert, the fly-half missed five of his ten tackles attempts and failed to get the attack firing on a regular basis.
The backline was far too lateral against England and he lacked the directness of Romain Ntamack and Ramos who took it a lot flatter to the line before inviting his teammates onto the ball.
Frankly put, Jalibert has yet to really win over Galthie and his antics last November would not have helped and while that hatchet is reportedly buried, his latest dropping suggests that is not the case.
Gael Fickou
Out of all of Galthie’s selection calls the decision to omit Fickou is even more surprising than the 7-1 split. The experienced midfielder remains one of the best in the business on his day and with the phenomenal centre pairing of Juan Ignacio Brex and Tommaso Menoncello.
Fickou is one of the best defensive operators in the game and is usually tasked with leading the Shaun Edwards-coached defence but not this week.
The 30-year-old is usually picked when fit making his omission all the more surprising.
Nolann Le Garrec
Playing second fiddle to Dupont is no easy task as your performance will always be measured against his and unfortunately, that’s the sad truth for Le Garrec.
He performed outstandingly in the captain’s absence last year in the Six Nations and despite offering the same versatility as Lucu, he is not the one back named on the bench.
Italy
The Azzurri’s task has got all the more difficult with France’s selections. Gonzalo Quesada’s charges will still fancy their chances but looking back to last year, it was the performance of their bench that almost sealed an historic victory over Les Bleus.
The last time Italy defeated France in the Six Nations was back in 2013, two years on from their maiden win with the width of the post denying Paolo Garbisi the winning kick in 2024.
But before Garbisi lined up the winning strike, it was the excellence of the Italian replacement forwards that created the opportunity, particularly of Manuel Zuliani who pilfered over to win the penalty.
Galthie would have been livid with the performance and has been plotting his revenge since which makes the decision to copy the Springboks ‘Bomb Squad’ tactic completely understandable.
Matt Williams
On the topic of the bench set-up, outspoken pundit and ex-Scotland coach Matt Williams’ face is surely redder than the card Ntamack was shown in Round One.
Williams has thrown just about every superlative at South Africa’s use of the tactic and teams that have followed suit by backing 6-2 splits in favour of the forwards.
He has even gone down the conspiracy theory route claiming that ‘pro-scrum penalty oligarchs’ are blocking any changes to the laws around the use of replacements.
While many fans will be eager to see how the French will fare with seven forwards being thrown into the mix in the latter stages of the match, Williams will still be fuming that ex-scrum-half Galthie is ‘discriminating against backs’.
Emmanuel Meafou
After a strong start to the Six Nations, powerhouse forward Meafou has been ruled out of the Italian clash due to illness.
He leaves a massive hole in the pack that Guillard is being tasked with filling. Galthie obviously believes that France need a huge effort from the pack against the Azzurri but they will do so without one of the biggest assets, literally.
Src: Planetrugby.com - https://www.planetrugby.com/news/france-team-winners-and-losers-as-vengeful-fabien-galthie-goes-nuclear-after-making-world-class-pair-scapegoats
