Head coach Fabien Galthié has named his matchday 23 for France’s opening November Nations Championship fixture against Fiji in Lyon.
Les Bleus head into the match ravaged by injuries, with Fabien Brau-Boirie, Emmanuel Meafou, Thibaud Flament, and Matthieu Jalibert all sidelined for the November internationals.
The injury crisis only worsened in the build-up to the meeting with Jake White’s Fiji, with Oscar Jegou sustaining a rib injury in training, ruling him out of Saturday’s meeting.
Les Bleus team to face Fiji
Despite the setbacks, Galthié has still named a strong team to face the Pacific Islanders with Antoine Dupont captaining the team from scrum-half where he partners Romain Ntamack. The 29-year-old has wrestled the starting number nine jersey off of Maxime Lucu, who shone for Les Bleus in their July Nations Championship fixtures in the absence of the Toulouse man. Lucu has been named on the bench with Galthié again favouring a 6-2 split.
Yoram Moefana continues as France’s starting inside centre and is joined in the midfield by rising star Kalvin Gourgues who makes his first start for Les Bleus after four appearances from the bench. Théo Attissogbe starts at full-back in the absence of Thomas Ramos after the Pau back featured on the wing in July whilst Louis Bielle-Biarrey returns on the left wing and Aaron Grandidier-Nkanang starts on the right.
François Cros gets the nod in the number eight jersey with Gregory Alldritt overlooked and the Toulouse back-rower is joined by Cameron Woki and Paul Boudehent in the loose trio.
Mickaël Guillard and Florian Verhaeghe are the starting locks in the absence of Meafou and Flament. Jean-Baptiste Gros is the starting loosehead prop for France, Sipili Falatea the tighthead while Maxime Lamothe has been favoured at hooker.
That means that Peato Mauvaka is the replacement hooker with Galthié loading his bench with the experienced loosehead Jefferson Poirot, who came out of international retirement earlier this year. Tighthead Régis Montagne, loose forward Charles Ollivon, and lock Tom Staniforth are also named on the bench along with Esteban Capilla, who is in line to make his Test debut against Fiji.
Lucu provides the backline cover in the 6-2 split along with Emilien Gailleton.
France team v Fiji
France: 15 Théo Attissogbe, 14 Aaron Grandidier-Nkanang, 13 Kalvin Gourgues, 12 Yoram Moefana, 11 Louis Bielle-Biarrey, 10 Romain Ntamack, 9 Antoine Dupont (c), 8 François Cros, 7 Paul Boudehent, 6 Cameron Woki, 5 Mickaël Guillard, 4 Florian Verhaeghe, 3 Sipili Falatea, 2 Maxime Lamothe, 1 Jean-Baptiste Gros
Replacements: 16 Peato Mauvaka, 17 Jefferson Poirot, 18 Régis Montagne, 19 Charles Ollivon, 20 Tom Staniforth, 21 Esteban Capilla, 22 Maxime Lucu, 23 Emilien Gailleton
Want more from Planet Rugby? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list for world-class coverage you can trust.
Date: Saturday, 7 November 2026
Venue: Groupama Stadium, Lyon
Kick-off: 21:10 (local), 20:10 (UK), 21:10 (France), 22:10 (South Africa), 07:10 (8 November, AEDT), 09:10 (8 November, New Zealand), 17:10 (Argentina), 05:10 (8 November, JST), 15:10 (EST)
Referee: Karl Dickson (RFU)
Assistant Referees: Damián Schneider (UAR) and Katsuki Furuse (JRFU)
TMO: Ian Tempest (RFU)
FPRO: Leo Colgan (IRFU)
Broadcasters: TF1 (France), ITV / ITVX (United Kingdom), Virgin Media Television (Republic of Ireland), Sky Italia (Italy), SuperSport (South Africa / Africa), Nine Network / Stan Sport (Australia), Sky Sport (New Zealand), FloSports (USA), Wowow (Japan)