Antoine Dupont

Antoine Dupont is the most famous rugby player on earth, and the rare case where the hype and the analysis point the same way. The Toulouse and France scrum-half has won World Rugby men’s player of the year, stacked French and European titles with Toulouse, captained France through a golden era, and detoured into sevens to win Olympic gold in Paris in 2024, a feat no other current XV superstar attempted.

What makes Dupont different is density of involvement. Scrum-halves are supposed to be facilitators; Dupont finishes like a wing, defends like a flanker and kicks like a ten, which means France effectively field an extra player wherever he is standing. His acceleration over five metres remains the best in the game, and his support lines — arriving on the shoulder at exactly the moment a defence believes the danger has passed — are studied by coaches at every level.

The serious knee injury he suffered in 2025 was treated as a national event in France, and the arc of his return has shaped how Les Bleus are judged since: France’s two-point defeat to New Zealand in July 2026 showed both how competitive they remain and how thin the margins are at the top. With the 2027 Rugby World Cup in Australia the next great target — and the one prize missing from his career — every season between now and then is framed as preparation.