France team: Fabien Galthie makes five changes including midfield shake-up for Scotland showdown

Adam Kyriacou
Yoram Moefana and Matthieu Jalibert start for France.

Yoram Moefana and Matthieu Jalibert start for France.

France head coach Fabien Galthie has made five changes to his starting XV for their crunch Six Nations showdown with Scotland at Murrayfield on Saturday.

Les Bleus are the only side in the Championship still boasting an unbeaten record, with three classy wins seeing them set the pace at the top summit ahead of Round Four.

But heading to the Scottish capital will provide a stern test to Galthie and his team and the France boss has decided to shake up his midfield and second-row partnerships.

Second-row swap

As he has done already in this year’s Six Nations, Galthie has swapped out his starting locks for the recently benched duo and that is a move he implements this week. Coming into the team that will run out at Murrayfield is Charles Ollivon and Mickael Guillard as Thibaud Flament and Emmanuel Meafou are on bench duty on Saturday.

Changes, as mentioned, also come in midfield as Fabien Brau-Boirie and Emilien Gailleton drop out of the squad and are replaced by Yoram Moefana and Nicolas Depoortere.

Elsewhere and the final tweak sees Matthieu Jalibert recover from injury to retake his spot at 10, this after he was a late withdrawal from the line-up that ran out against Italy.

Antoine Dupont continues to skipper from the base while the electric Louis Bielle-Biarrey, Theo Attissogbe and Thomas Ramos are reunited in the back three for Les Bleus.

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Other than the second-row changes it is as you were in the forward pack as France look to make it four wins out of four and bring the Grand Slam further into view in 2026.

There is one other alteration on the French bench that will take on Scotland as Demba Bamba comes in for Georges Henri-Colombe as the replacement tighthead prop.

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France team to face Scotland

France: 15 Thomas Ramos, 14 Theo Attissogbe, 13 Nicolas Depoortere, 12 Yoram Moefana, 11 Louis Bielle-Biarrey, 10 Matthieu Jalibert, 9 Antoine Dupont (c), 8 Anthony Jelonch, 7 Oscar Jegou, 6 Francois Cros, 5 Mickael Guillard, 4 Charles Ollivon, 3 Dorian Aldegheri, 2 Julien Marchand, 1 Jean-Baptiste Gros
Replacements: 16 Peato Mauvaka, 17 Rodrigue Neti, 18 Demba Bamba, 19 Thibaud Flament, 20 Emmanuel Meafou, 21 Lenni Nouchi, 22 Baptiste Serin, 23 Pierre-Louis Barassi

Date: Saturday, March 7
Venue: Scottish Gas Murrayfield, Edinburgh
Kick-off: 14:10 GMT
Referee: Angus Gardner (RA)
Assistant Referees: Andrew Brace (IRFU), Craig Evans (WRU)
TMO: Brett Cronan (RA)
FPRO: Olly Hodges (IRFU)
TV: BBC, Virgin Media, Premier Sports, TF1, SuperSport, Sky Italia, Sky NZ, Stan Sports, Peacock

READ MORE: Six Nations Round Four: Fixtures, kick-off times, TV coverage, referee change and more