{"id":511994,"date":"2026-03-01T15:12:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-01T15:12:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/511994\/"},"modified":"2026-03-01T15:12:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-01T15:12:08","slug":"demba-bamba-gets-france-re-call-after-unlucky-142kg-giant-withdrawn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/511994\/","title":{"rendered":"Demba Bamba gets France re-call after unlucky 142kg giant withdrawn"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Demba Bamba has been added to the France<\/a> squad after Tevita Tatafu<\/a> was ruled out of Saturday\u2019s Six Nations<\/a> trip to Scotland.<\/p>\n

The FFR confirmed Tatafu\u2019s withdrawal ahead of the match at Murrayfield but did not specify the reason for his absence.<\/p>\n

Head coach Fabien Galthi\u00e9 has turned to Racing 92<\/a> tighthead Bamba as cover.<\/p>\n

The desperately unlucky Tatafu had been called up on Friday as part of a 42-man training group preparing for the Edinburgh<\/a> fixture.<\/p>\n

The 23-year-old has endured a stop-start campaign and had played just 53 minutes of Top 14<\/a> rugby this season prior to the weekend, following his return from injury.<\/p>\n

Handed his first start of the season for Bayonne<\/a> away to Clermont<\/a> on Saturday, the 142kg prop was forced off after 32 minutes before returning for the closing stages of the 38-15 defeat.<\/p>\n

He featured for 26 minutes against Castres<\/a> in round 15 and 31 minutes against Racing 92 in round 17.<\/p>\n

It marked another frustrating chapter in a season disrupted by injury. Tatafu missed the entire start of the campaign due to an ankle problem sustained in a pre-season fixture against Stade Toulousain and was absent throughout the Autumn Nations Series.<\/p>\n

He was recalled by Galthi\u00e9 in January to the enlarged Six Nations training squad but has yet to feature in the championship. Tatafu had already withdrawn from the group prior to the round three win over Italy<\/a> in Villeneuve-d\u2019Ascq.<\/p>\n

Bamba, 27, brings 29 caps\u2019 worth of experience. He played in one of France\u2019s three Tests during last summer\u2019s tour of New Zealand<\/a> and has re-established himself at club level after his own injury-hit spell last season.<\/p>\n

The Racing 92 prop has started 11 of his 19 appearances in the current campaign and will now compete with Dorian Aldegheri<\/a> and Georges-Henri Colombe<\/a> for selection at tighthead as France chase a fourth successive Six Nations victory on the trot.<\/p>\n

UPDATED 42-MAN FRANCE SQUAD:<\/p>\n

FORWARDS
Dorian Aldegheri (Stade Toulousain)
Hugo Auradou (Section Paloise)
Paul Boudehent (Stade Rochelais)
Joshua Brennan (Stade Toulousain)
Demba Bamba (Racing 92)
Georges-Henri Colombe (Stade Toulousain)
Fran\u00e7ois Cros (Stade Toulousain)
Thibaud Flament (Stade Toulousain)
Jean-Baptiste Gros (RC Toulon)
Micka\u00ebl Guillard (Lyon<\/a> OU Rugby)
Oscar Jegou (Stade Rochelais)
Anthony Jelonch (Stade Toulousain)
Thomas Laclayat (Section Paloise)
Maxime Lamothe (Union Bordeaux<\/a> B\u00e8gles)
Julien Marchand (Stade Toulousain)
Temo Matiu (Union Bordeaux B\u00e8gles)
Peato Mauvaka (Stade Toulousain)
Emmanuel Meafou (Stade Toulousain)
Rodrigue Neti (Stade Toulousain)
Lenni Nouchi (Montpellier<\/a> H\u00e9rault Rugby)
Charles Ollivon (RC Toulon)
Dany Priso (RC Toulon)
Alexandre Roumat (Stade Toulousain)
Thomas Staniforth (Castres Olympique)<\/p>\n

BACKS:
Gr\u00e9goire Arfeuil (Section Paloise)
Th\u00e9o Attissogbe (Section Paloise)
Pierre-Louis Barassi (Stade Toulousain)
L\u00e9o Barr\u00e9 (Stade Fran\u00e7ais)
Louis Bielle-Biarrey (Union Bordeaux B\u00e8gles)
Fabien Brau-Boirie (Section Paloise)
Nicolas Depoortere (Union Bordeaux B\u00e8gles)
Ga\u00ebl Dr\u00e9an (RC Toulon)
Antoine Dupont (Stade Toulousain)
\u00c9milien Gailleton (Section Paloise)
Kalvin Gourgues (Stade Toulousain)
Matthieu Jalibert (Union Bordeaux B\u00e8gles)
Nolann Le Garrec (Stade Rochelais)
Yoram Moefana (Union Bordeaux B\u00e8gles)
Thomas Ramos (Stade Toulousain)
Baptiste Serin (RC Toulon)
Ugo Seunes (Racing 92)
Gabin Villi\u00e8re (RC Toulon)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Demba Bamba has been added to the France squad after Tevita Tatafu was ruled out of Saturday\u2019s Six…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":511995,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-511994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=511994"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511994\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/511995"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=511994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=511994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=511994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}