France vs Fiji rugby team selection Stade Toulousain players, Digi Mart USA News (Lyon, France): Seeing many Toulouse players start a match has become normal, almost routine. So when few Stadistes appear in the starting fifteen, as will be the case Saturday in France’s next Nations Championship match, it stands out.
Facing the unpredictable Fiji side, only four players from Haute-Garonne are expected to start Saturday night in Lyon (9:10 p.m. local time): François Cros, Antoine Dupont, Romain Ntamack and Kalvin Gourgues.
This is an extremely rare occurrence that has not happened for some time.
Outside summer tours, which are often treated as experimental with many absences due to the late end of the Top 14 season, the last time this happened was February 10, 2024. That day, France traveled to Scotland for the second round of the Six Nations Championship.
Still traumatized by the 2023 World Cup quarterfinal lost by one point to South Africa months earlier, and without Antoine Dupont, who was chasing gold with the sevens team at the Paris Olympics, a sick France side took the field at Murrayfield.
Beaten a week earlier by Ireland in the tournament opener at the Vélodrome (17-38), France did not convince against Scotland, winning a miraculous victory 20-16. The Toulouse players starting that match were Cyril Baille, Peato Mauvaka, François Cros and Thomas Ramos.
Today the situation is entirely different, but the result is the same. This time a wave of injuries prevents Toulouse players from being selected.
Julien Marchand, Thibaud Flament, Joshua Brennan, Emmanuel Meafou, Anthony Jelonch, Pierre-Louis Barassi and Thomas Ramos are all out, at least for the start of this second phase of the Nations Championship.
After facing Fiji at the start, France will then face the autumn’s big test, South Africa, before taking on Argentina. A final ranking match is also scheduled for the last weekend of November.
