Fabien Galthié has used the French term “ovni” to describe a handful of players who are atypical when it comes to traditional rugby pathways. The word translates as UFOs and one player who has had that descriptive moniker bestowed on him is secondrow Thibaud Flament.
France’s head coach enthused: “Thibaud Flament, for example, [has taken] an Anglo-Saxon path. He started rugby in Belgium, then left for Argentina before landing in an English college. This player, as his father used to say, has always been inhabited by this flame.
“When he was younger, he would fall asleep every night with the poster of the French team hanging on the ceiling of his room. In the evening, his last glance was therefore at the tricolores. His example encourages all the youngsters who were not selected for training centres to believe in themselves.”
While other “ovni” such as Anthony Bouthier, Melvyn Jaminet, Gabin Villière and Mohamed Haouas have come and gone during Galthié’s reign, the 27-year-old Flament’s athletic elegance has found the perfect outlet in the Test match arena. It’s a far cry from playing for Loughborough University fifths in British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) rugby, especially as a 6ft 8in outhalf.
Flament’s backstory offers vivid colour in its unconventionality. In five years he went from playing rugby in Belgium with the ASUB Waterloo club to a first cap against Argentina at the Stade de France in November 2021.
In that period, he pitched up for trials at Loughborough, signed a professional contract with Wasps, and spent a year playing club rugby in Argentina while working in the French embassy.
“The rugby has always been the main focus,” he explained in an interview. “My aim, my dream was to be a professional rugby player, and all my decisions were based around that. The choice of going to study in the UK was a means to an end, to reach that objective, and that’s why I chose to go to Loughborough.”
It was at Loughborough that he transitioned from outhalf to secondrow, and it was the 12 months in Argentina that accelerated his development. “It was a life-changing year,” he said. “The way they play rugby and live life in Argentina was very different to what I had experienced before.
“It shifted the way I saw the game. When I arrived there, I realised I was putting too much pressure on myself and not enjoying it. Seeing people in Argentina play, I could see the way they enjoyed themselves and focused on having fun and having a great time. I think that’s what made me become a better player and a better person.”
He placed his trust in Club Newman in the greater Buenos Aires area; someone picked him up at the airport, someone else gave him a place to stay for a few weeks until he found somewhere of his own. When he returned to England, Wasps offered him a professional contract in June.
Within six months Toulouse made contact and persuaded him to move to the south of France, while another call came from France’s forwards coach William Servat. Flament was included on a long list of 75 players whom the national side were interested in keeping tabs on with a view to the 2023 World Cup. He never played for any underage national French side.
A couple of metatarsal injuries stalled his initial progress but by the end of his first season at Toulouse he was celebrating a Top 14 and Champions Cup double triumph; later that year (2021) it was apposite that his France debut was against Argentina.
He recalled: “The game had a lot of meaning to me. Playing for France has been my dream forever and since I came back from Argentina, my dream was to play against them in my first game.” Pumas secondrow Tomás Lavanini rag-dolled him in a tackle but Flament survived the encounter and went on to celebrate his first cap with a try, the first of six, in 30 Tests to date.
He twice played against Ireland: as a replacement in the 2022 Six Nations when France won 30-24 at the Stade de France and in the run-on team alongside Paul Willemse two years later when Andy Farrell’s side prevailed 32-19 in Dublin.
Flament missed France’s Six Nations defeat to Ireland in Marseille last season but played a pivotal role when Toulouse beat Leinster in the Champions Cup final at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium last season and then doubled up by claiming the French Top 14 title.
He has the physical qualities to play secondrow or backrow and has excelled in both capacities. It would be limiting to categorise him as a dilettante when it comes to the nitty-gritty of forward play, or to suggest that he’s only effective when roaming in wider pastures. Flament is a complete player, and a dangerous opponent given his footwork, speed and handling. By way of comparison, a slightly taller version of Ryan Baird. He is very much a first-choice option.
The talk from Marcoussis this week is that Mickaël Guillard will partner him in the secondrow, with Emmanuel Meafou, who missed the Italian match through illness, having to be content with a place on the bench.
Almost 3½ years after making his international debut and just 5½ years since his first professional contract, Flament has long ceased to be an “unidentified flying object”. Au contraire.
