No rush to get Tuilagi involved

SOMETHING of a big deal was made last week about the fact that, a matter of days before Fabien Galthie announces his first French squad of 2024, Perpignan second-row sensation Posolo Tuilagi does not have a French passport.

- JAMES HARRINGTON

Remember the brouhaha over Emmanuel Meafou and his long-delayed bid to play for France? 

The good news for Les Bleus and, arguably, bad news for international rivals is that he has his French passport, has completed World Rugby's required five-year residency, and is available for Six Nations' selection.

Expect to see Meafou's name in Galthie's first post-World Cup squad selection on Wednesday, barring any injury concerns following Toulouse's Champions Cup trip to the Kingspan yesterday.

The frustrating news, perhaps, for him is that at least part of that process has become unnecessary.

What we could perhaps call the Tuilagi affair threatened to reach the same level of deal as the Meafou affair. For a while, it seemed the passport issue meant that the young Perpignan star would not be selectable for France's senior men's squad for this year's Six Nations.

Tuilagi has lived in the southwest of the country since he was three, when his father Henry signed for Perpignan. The family has settled there.

He's gone through the French education system and passed his baccalaureate last summer. To all intents and purposes, he is French. But the thing is: it's not official Tuilagi was born in Samoa in 2004, and has not yet gone to the trouble of taking the final administrative step.

At U20 level, this was never a problem. A French passport was only ever an issue for the senior men's side following a decision by former FFR president Bernard Laporte shortly after coming into office in 2016. Now, apparently, it's not a requirement anymore.