Baptiste Erdocio

Baptiste Erdocio is 1.75m tall and weighs 115kg. In most positions that combination would be a problem. At loosehead prop it is close to ideal, because the scrum rewards a low man, and it is a fair part of why France capped him against New Zealand.

He props for Montpellier and is 26.

Bidart is his home town, and the Bidart Union Club had him first. Biarritz took him at cadet level, brought him into the academy at eighteen, and gave him a first team debut on 9 October 2021 against Lyon.

Montpellier came next, for three years from the 2023-24 season. He did not settle in slowly. He played in almost every match of that first season and was regularly picked ahead of Enzo Forletta, a France international at the same position, which is not the usual experience of a 23-year-old arriving in the Top 14.

The international call followed the pattern. France A picked him against an England XV at Twickenham in June 2025 and he started in a win. He went straight onto the summer tour of New Zealand, started the second Test at Wellington on 12 July, and was capped against the All Blacks. Three caps have followed, all of them starts.

He signed on at Montpellier to 2029 immediately afterwards, which tells you what the club thought of the summer. He won the Challenge Cup in 2026 and lost a French championship final in the same season.

A scrummaging loosehead first and a carrier second, and at 26 he has the years to become the first-choice French one.