XV of France: world champion, friendship with Bielle-Biarrey, mullet cut... 5 things to know about Nicolas Depoortère

Last season, the new recruit to the French team to prepare for the Tournament wore the jersey of the professional team in the Top 14 for the first time in his young career. Aligned 12 times, the three-quarter center even entered the game during the victorious play-off against Lyon, then during the semi-final lost against Stade Rochelais. A rise which continues this season since the player trained in Izon, in Gironde, has become unbreakable within the UBB attack. Often associated with Moefana, Depoortère took part in 13 matches in all competitions for four tries scored. Solid.

Nicolas Depoortère will long remember his first in the Top 14, on December 23, 2022. While he was 24th man for a trip to La Rochelle, everything went very quickly. After receiving a call from Julien Laïrle (ex-UBB coach and now Clermont defense coach), the Bordeaux player was summoned to the office of Frédéric Charrier, ex-UBB coach. "And then he said to me: 'Jean-Baptiste Dubié is ill, you come on as a replacement.' I was so happy. I go back to the room and I jump into the arms of “Loulou” (Bielle-Biarrey) who is also too happy for me,” he confided to L’Équipe. A relief for the three-quarter center, who was under stress when he heard the news, thinking that the Bordeaux-Béglais coaches were going to reproach him - as well as his roommates - for having made too much noise...

2023 was definitely a pivotal year for Depoortère. In the middle of the season, the three-quarter center was logically called up with the French under-20s to play in the World Cup in South Africa. Seen as one of the best players in the competition, the native of Pessac was crowned with a world champion title with the French team. A turning point in his young career. Depoortère even finished joint-top scorer (5 tries), tied with two young New Zealanders and a Georgian. His association with the Palois Émilien Gailleton - also selected this Wednesday - had caused a lot of damage.

Sport is above all friends. And Depoortère will not say the opposite. The player trained at Izon is linked to Louis Bielle-Biarrey, the small flying winger of the XV of France and the UBB. To the point of doing everything, or almost everything, together. “We are together all the time and we experience things together. We each have our own apartment five minutes from each other but I'm at his house all the time. We get out of training, we go to his house. We sleep. Afterwards, we're going to play PlayStation. We go shopping, we eat. Sometimes I sleep at his house and we go to training together. We are the same, we are not stressed human beings,” the person told L’Équipe. And on the ground, the relationship works more than well.

Depoortère is above all a big guy (1.93 m, 96 kg). In admiration of the sacred monsters that are the All Black Sonny Bill Williams and the Frenchman Yannick Jauzion, the future cap had nevertheless been judged “too light” by his former coach Christophe Urios. “When Christophe told me that, I wanted to show him that even though I was a little light, I still weighed 92 kg, we could play in the Top 14,” the under-20 world champion replied to The Team. Her haircut, in mullet style, does not go unnoticed. However, she is more discreet than a few months ago, when the swift three-quarter length had long curly hair. Before undergoing a little hazing…