XV de France: "Not too much doubt that Dupont will play the quarter," announces William Servat

This is the soap opera that has worried the rugby France since Thursday night. Injured against Namibia Thursday night in Marseille and operated the day after a fracture in the cheekbone, the captain of the Blues Antoine Dupont has since returned to his village of Castelnau-Magnoac (Hautes-Pyrénées) to breathe in the company of his loved ones. But for its part, the staff of the XV of France gave Tuesday very optimistic and reassuring news of the state of health of its scrum-half by the voice of William Servat, co-coach in charge of the conquest tricolor.

"I don't necessarily have too many doubts about whether he will play in the quarter-finals (October 14 and 15). It is rather the match of Italy (October 6) that questions me, explains the former hooker. Antoine is doing very well today. The operation went very well. He is resting, he will be back with us for training on Sunday, Friday and Saturday being days off. He will have time to come back. »

"The will that he resumes as soon as possible"

"Antoine will join us next weekend. Our first concern is to take care of the players we coach because we love them, continues William Servat. He will resume at his own pace, with the will that he resume as soon as possible in the best case, but pending the medical green light. He will apply very quickly on the match sheets. »

"I'm not a surgeon. This is not a Sunday morning PMU discussion. Doctors have exchanged with him, "he castigated to denounce the debates around the dangerousness of a return too early. "We were with Fabien Barthez in training, he told us that he had surgery on the same thing in Manchester, he was able to play ten days later. And that was a little while ago, since then there have been advances in medicine. The hearsay, the people who discuss... Let us be reasonable, let the experts talk about these things and respect them a little. »

According to our weekend information, a delay of three weeks was the most optimistic forecast before seeing Antoine Dupont on a rugby field. The player had two plates placed in Toulouse on Friday night, and is not expected to resume training until Sunday. Les Bleus are scheduled to face Italy on Friday, October 6 in Lyon, before continuing with a potential quarter-final on the weekend of October 14-15 in Saint-Denis. In the absence of Toulouse, coach Fabien Galthié has two scrum-halfs, Maxime Lucu and Baptiste Couilloud.