Galthie turns his sights to the future

FRANCE head coach Fabien Galthie offered the clearest hint yet of Les Bleus' future on Wednesday, when he released 19 players back F to their clubs for the ninth and final Top 14 round before the international break.

- JAMES HARRIGTON

There remain plenty of if, buts, maybes and caveats, with injuries depriving Galthie of a number of players who would otherwise expect to be in the reckoning for the first squad of the autumn, including Posolo Tuilagi and Romain Ntamack.

But three names on the release list stood out: Charles Ollivon, Jonathan Danty, and Maxime Lucu.

Toulon's Ollivon was the most surprising name on the list. He was Galthie's first captain back in 2020 and only very rarely has had a sub-par game in national colours.

Maybe age he is 31 - has counted against him for these autumn Tests. But, he has long appeared untouchable as far as France are concerned.

Clearly, that's no longer the case.

In releasing Ollivon and keeping Toulouse's less-demonstrative but no less effective Alexandre Roumat -a 27-year-old stripling - Galthie has lost nothing and gained the prospect of developing a player more likely to make the plane to Australia in 2027.

Lucu, it's clear, has slipped down the scrum-half rankings below Nolann Le Garrec. But the Racing 92 scrum-half went for tests on Saturday after picking up a knee injury in training. Conditioning coach Nicolas Jeanjean insisted in an interview with Midi Olympique that it's, 'not serious' - but word is that Le Garrec could be out for 10 days, meaning he will miss the match against Japan and may be a doubt for the Test against New Zealand a week later.

Lucu would then move up the rankings again into the Antoine Dupont understudy role, with either Baptiste Serin or Baptiste Couilloud expected to be called up as cover.