Lucu replaces Dupont at the scrum, Ollivon captain… The composition of the French XV revealed for the decisive match against Italy

You don’t change a winning team much. The French XV revealed, Wednesday October 4, the composition of the team which must qualify for the quarter-finals during the last group match against Italy, Friday October 6, at Groupama Stadium in Lyon. Without Antoine Dupont, victim of a maxillo-zygomatic fracture against Namibia and forfeited for the match, Fabien Galthié and his staff chose to trust Bordeaux’s Maxime Lucu. Already starting in the second match against Uruguay, the usual finisher will be associated with his club teammate Matthieu Jalibert.

Antoine Dupont absent, it is Charles Ollivon who will be captain on the Lyon lawn, he who had fulfilled this role in the blue jersey at the start of the Galthié mandate and until his serious cruciate ligament injury in June 2021. “It’s a wink, it also represents our four years of work together and our desire to support our players in their development. It’s a way to pay tribute to him. Today he is here”appreciated the French coach Fabien Galthié, thanked for these words by his captain placed at his side.

Alldritt back on third line

Back from injury and starting for the first time in the competition against Namibia, Cyril Baille and Jonathan Danty continue, just like all the other starters in the match against the Welwitschias, apart from François Cros, who leaves his place to Grégory Alldritt, who had been spared against the African team.

In the second row, Cameron Woki makes his fourth start in a row, and remains for the moment the only player in the France group to have started all the matches since the start of the World Cup. The youngest of the group, Louis Bielle-Biarrey, who in mid-September became the youngest Frenchman to play a World Cup match, and author of a remarkable start to the tournament (three tries scored), is again preferred to Gabin Villière on the left wing.