Great to see Dupont going for Paris gold

RATHER overlooked during a hectic end of season in France which saw Toulouse march off with all four national titles – Top 14, U20, U18 and U16 – was a report in the authoritative Le Parisien insisting that Antoine Dupont will be missing some or even all of the 2024 Six Nations to pursue his dream of also winning an Olympic gold medal at the Paris Olympics next July.

- BRENDAN GALLAGHER

Now if that comes about it could be the biggest boost to the Sevens game since Jonah Lomu and Christian Cullen suddenly emerged on the scene in the mid-90s to take various tournaments and championships by storm.

Household names and world stars is what Sevens needs, a bit of stardust to set it apart and to get all rugby fans engaged again, not just the Sevens diehards. Sevens has become a little too niche, a sport on its own played mainly by those who do not engage with the 15s game anymore. That needs to change.

The men’s and women’s Olympic tournaments will occupy six days at the Stade de France ahead of the athletics and Dupont’s presence alone would virtually guarantee 80,000 sellouts for every session of the men’s tournament.

Rugby Sevens has deliberately been placed front and centre of the entire Olympics by the French authorities and, after a low key start at Rio in 2016 and a crowd-less tournament at the delayed Covid Tokyo Olympics in 2021, this will be a huge moment for the sport. This is why various visionaries fought for decades to get rugby, in the form of Sevens, reintroduced to the Olympics.

In a departure from precedent, the pool stages of the men’s tournament will be held over two days at the Stade ahead of the Olympic opening ceremony itself, after which all concerned will come back for the knockout and medal matches the day after. The women’s event will then be run over three days following the men’s competition.