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Antoine Dupont's seamless return to 15s shows SVNS impact on his game
By Ian Cameron
Les Bleus' Antoine Dupont returned to the 15-a-side game with an eye-catching performance for Toulouse against Bordeaux-Begles in the Top 14 match on Sunday.
After a stint with France's SVNS team, Dupont was initially named as a replacement scrum-half for the game. However, an early injury to Thomas Ramos saw Dupont stepping in as fly-half just four minutes into the match.
The highlight reel moment arrived in the 60th minute - showing that if anything - the SVNS circuit has sharpened his edge with ball in hand and in terms of his pace.
With Toulouse attacking to the left of a ruck in Bordeaux's 22 , Dupont executed a strong hand-off before running an arcing line towards the left corner. In the face of an impending tackle, he somehow managed to offload the ball to Matthis Lebel, who finished off the try.
This particular play drew significant praise from fans and commentators, who were gushing at the French superstar's skill level.
Antoine Dupont. Freak. pic.twitter.com/5E25o3ssiR
— Jared Wright (@jaredwright17) March 24, 2024
Despite his recent absence from the Six Nations due to Sevens commitments, Dupont's performance in this Top 14 match demonstrated that the SVNS circuit is adding to his already intimidating arsenal of attacking weapons.
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After a fairly simple Pac4, the BFs will find out a lot about themselves in September when they face the rampaging RedRoses at Twickenham in front of a record crowd. After that they will face them again in Canada in WXV1. They also have France to contend with. Will be interesting to see what Australia have to offer with Jo Yapp at the helm.
Go to commentsSuper Rugby Pacific has been better as a spectacle due to the emphasis on speeding the game up and I’d look at taking things a step further. Instead of giving teams 90 seconds to take a conversion, let’s bring that down 60 seconds. You could also look at allowing 45 seconds for a penalty goal. Maybe teams could get 20 seconds instead of 30 to form a scrum before the ref then starts the engagement process. However, this year the most pleasing change is the added competitiveness in the Trans Tasman matches. What does frustrate me is how the rugby media in Australasia allow the the whole ‘‘rugby is boring’’/’’rugby yawnion’’ narrative to take hold from from vindictive league types, the chairman of the ARL commission and News Limited Australia. Stick up for the game and shift the narrative!
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