The same 23 players who were involved as France avoided an RBS 6 Nations
"whitewash" by drawing with Ireland last weekend have earned the right to remain on duty against Scotland on Saturday. However, Philippe Saint-Andre, their head coach, has been unable to resist some tinkering.
He has made three changes to his side, at least one of which appears to have surprised the visitors to Paris since Grant Gilchrist, Scotland's debutant lock, had indicated that he expected to be up against Yoann Maestri and Christophe Samson. Instead Saint-Andre has set up a like-for-like contest in giving Sebastien Vahaamahina, younger than Gilchrist at 21, his first start.
In terms of international experience the Frenchman has a marginal advantage since, like Gilchrist, he had his first taste of Test action in the autumn but, unlike the Scot, who watched helplessly as his side lost to Tonga, Vahaamahina came off the bench to win a first cap in the comprehensive defeat of Australia, before earning a second in Dublin.
Gilchrist has got the better of Maestri before – as part of the Edinburgh team that defeated Toulouse in last year's Heineken Cup quarter-final – while he should be able to find out all he needs to about Vahaamahina from Al Strokosch, a clubmate of the Frenchman's at Perpignan. What confronts the Scottish debutant, then, looks rather less intimidating than it might have been.
The same may not pertain to the midfield, where Matt Scott and Sean Lamont must deal with the bovine Mathieu Bastareaud, with Florian Fritz dropping to the bench. The 24-year-old Toulon centre's latest recall may have been partly influenced by the fact that his only two Test tries to date were scored at Murrayfield in 2010, kicking off what was to be a grand slam campaign.
The other change is in the back row as Antonie Claassen, the 28-year-old son of a Springbok captain and a late arrival on the scene, makes his first Test start for France, having won his only previous caps as a replacement against both England and Ireland.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article