Why the All Blacks will face a better France team than last year - even with Antoine Dupont still missing
Wednesday, 1 July 2026
ANALYSIS: France are not going to be at their best when they play the All Blacks in Christchurch on Saturday.
Their Toulouse players are all unavailable after playing the Top 14 final last weekend, while star halfback Antoine Dupont was a late withdrawal from their squad to face the Wallabies next week.
Of the players who started France’s final Six Nations game against England in March, only three or four are likely to start against the All Blacks - Théo Attissogbe, Yoram Moefana and Matthieu Jalibert are the leading candidates.
The All Blacks, therefore, will start the game as heavy favourites but there is still a reason to be wary of this French team even without resorting to the old cliches about unpredictable Gallic temperament.
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Oddly, Bordeaux-Begles won the Champions Cup this year but finished outside the top six in the highly competitive Top 14 competition.
As a result, their top players all missed the Top 14 playoffs and are available for coach Fabien Galthie.
According to French media reports, he intends to use them.
Les Bleus let French journalists into their training sessions and they are free to report not just on the formation at training but the instructions being yelled out by the French coaches.
By all accounts Jalibert is going to start at No 10 against the All Blacks, which instantly makes this team stronger than the one that travelled to New Zealand last year.
Jalibert has usurped the injury-prone Romain Ntamack as France’s first-choice No 10.
His Bordeaux halfback partner Maxime Lucu has been named as tour captain, making it likely that he will play in Christchurch (if not Nolann Le Garrec is a more than capable starter).
Brilliant Bordeaux winger Damian Penaud is also available, while the predicted loose forward trio of Mickaël Guillard, Marko Gazzotti and Oscar Jegou are all young but established stars in the Top 14 with test experience.
The French, who have based themselves in Brisbane and will fly into Christchurch later in the week, look poised to employ a dynamic game plan against the All Blacks, with plenty of ball movement.
That’s how they played in their warm-up game against England A in France two weeks ago, and it is certainly the way that Bordeaux like to play.
Without some of their Toulouse heavy hitters in the tight five, there might be a question mark about their set-piece work.
They are into the second- or third-choice options in the front row, so the All Blacks might see some vulnerability at scrum time.
But the French are capable of asking plenty of questions with ball in hand and the All Blacks defence will have to be far better connected than it was in the first test against France in Dunedin last year.
Lucu and Jalibert will also offer a far more educated kicking game than has been evident in Super Rugby Pacific, including contestables aimed at wingers Penaud and Attissogbe.
The latter was a standout for the French in New Zealand last year and he’s still just 21 years old.
The French aren’t afraid of chucking young players into the test arena, and they’ll play with real ambition under the roof in Christchurch.
Possible French team: Max Spring, Damian Penaud, Nicolas Depoortère, Yoram Moefana, Théo Attissogbe, Matthieu Jalibert, Maxime Lucu (captain); Mickaël Guillard, Marko Gazzotti, Oscar Jegou, Hugo Auradou, Tom Staniforth, Régis Montagne, Maxime Lamothe, Jefferson Poirot.