Do we like them?

Do we like Antoine Dupont?

Our score: 7 out of 10. A clean harm record and a decent rep, but the record on good works is thin and the salary-cap row is unresolved.

Antoine Dupont is the Toulouse scrum-half and France captain, the bloke most people in rugby call the best in the world. He signed on with Toulouse until 2031, and came back late last year after months out with a ruptured knee ligament from the Six Nations win in Dublin.

The big career swerve was the Olympics. He skipped the 2024 Six Nations to chase sevens gold, then came off the bench at half-time in the final as France beat Fiji 28-7 at the Stade de France. His line afterwards, “this is a team victory, not just one guy,” is a pretty good tell about how he sees himself.

The mess is money. In February L'Equipe reported alleged payments of about 1.5 million euros since 2017 from Toulouse sponsor 3S-Alyzia to Dupont for image rights, and alleged the deals may have been a way around the salary cap. Dupont's lawyer said the sums were normal fees for a player of his stature, Toulouse denies any secret pact, and the club said it would lodge a defamation complaint. No final decision was reported, so it stays an allegation.

On the harm check, honestly, there's not much to report. We found no hostile words or campaigns from him about LGBTQ+ people, women, migrants, climate or public health, and no run of dodgy company. The closest thing to a grey spot is that he was asked about two teammates, who were accused of rape in Argentina, being picked for the team after a judge dismissed the case. He said he hadn't felt any awkwardness and the group was focused on its own game.

The recent news is injury, not scandal. On 29 June he confirmed a calf injury on Instagram, saying it was with a heavy heart that he withdrew from the matches against Australia and Japan, and Paul Graou replaced him. We couldn't find reporting on what has happened since, so that's where the picture ends.

The good stuff is mostly on the field, which is fair enough but not a lot of evidence of off-field generosity. We did find that he has been associated with charity work, but not in a source we could open and check, so we can't give him credit for it here. Gold at his home Olympics, taken in a different code to the one he's famous for, is the one thing we can properly pin down.