Fired-up France name strong team as Ritchie returns for Scotland
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France have made 13 changes to the team who were stunned in Scotland last week, as this week’s visitors welcome back usual skipper Jamie Ritchie for their trip to Paris.
2021 World Rugby Player of the Year Antoine Dupont plays scrum-half and captains alongside Toulouse teammate Romain Ntamack in the half-backs, with an all-Rouge et Noir front row comprising half of six changes to the pack as props Cyril Baille and Dorian Aldegheri are joined by hooker Julien Marchand.
Another Toulouse player, Thibault Flament, comes into the second row with Charles Ollivon and Gregory Aldritt helping make up a typically stellar back row.
Alongside Dupont and Ntamack in the backline Jonathan Danty and Gael Fickou line-up together in the centres, with Damian Penaud and Gabin Villiere as the wingers either side of Thomas Ramos as the full-back.
Scotland have taken something of a different approach to other nations with their warm-up matches since they started their August campaign with a more experimental team against Italy.
Since then they have gradually made their team stronger, and name something close to their best team for this Saturday’s clash.
One of the six changes sees Ritchie into the back row as skipper, joined by captain from the Italy game a fortnight ago – Rory Darge – in the back row and with two new front rowers as George Turner replaces Ewan Ashman and WP Nel comes in for the suspended Zander Fagerson.
Rounding off the changes, Ali Price joins Finn Russell in the half-backs and Kyle Steyn comes in for Darcy Graham on the wing, after the latter starred in last week’s victory.
On the changes, Scotland boss Gregor Townsend said: “This week is an opportunity to manage people’s game time – Darcy has played in the two games – and give others an opportunity.
“Jamie was back in full training this week. He is the only player who hasn’t had game time, but he has coped well in the fast training we have done this week.
“WP Nel was really good off the bench last week and has trained fully throughout this pre-season, which was ahead of our expectations. He’s in great condition and is highly motivated to still play for Scotland.”
France: Ramos, Penaud, Fickou, Danty, Villiere, Ntamack, Dupont (c), Alldritt, Ollivon, Boudehent, Flament, Woki, Aldegheri, Marchand, Baille
Replacements: Bourgarit, Gros, Atonio, Verhaeghe, Chalureau, Macalou, Lucu, Bielle-Biarrey
Scotland: B Kinghorn, K Steyn, H Jones, S Tuipulotu, D van der Merwe, F Russell, A Price; P Schoeman, G Turner, W Nel, R Gray, G Gilchrist, J Ritchie, R Darge, J Dempsey.
Replacements: S McInally, R Sutherland, J Sebastian, S Cummings, S Skinner, J Bayliss, G Horne, O Smith
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