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He played for France U18s when they beat the touring Australian side in 2012(?), spent the last few years in the Dragons reserve team in the French league and made one Super League appearance as a substitute last year, although I'm not sure if he actually got on the field. I've been excited about him for a while, there's a video on YouTube of him scoring a try from inside his own half in the French Cup a few weeks ago.
Bousquet has been in first grade for years, easy to forget that he's only 23. Benjamin Garcia is another showing real promise, he scored a great try against Hull KR. I was thinking during that game that France could have a pretty handy side in 2017 and beyond, a spine of Escare, Fages and Pelissier could be really threatening if they can find another half.
I think he's still there but he seems to have been out of the team in recent weeks, I'm not sure he's more than a Championship standard half. It's a shame Barthau got such a bad injury when he was finally going to get a chance to establish himself as a first choice half for a side, I was looking forward to seeing how he went for London this year.
Absolutely, although I've said many times that there's nothing stopping English clubs from signing any of these players. A lot of English fans (and until recently, clubs) seem to have this strange mentality that all French players should have to be playing in France.
I think that was Garcia's first ever match at centre. He's normally a back-rower/lock.
Dureau has been absolutely dreadful this season. He's already announced that he's leaving at the end of the year and I'm pretty sure they would ship him off now if they weren't already down to their fifth-choice halfback.
