More fear than harm for Baptiste Serin. Badly hurt in the ribs against Racing 92 last weekend, the international scrum-half will miss Sunday’s trip to Toulouse. He could be back on the pitch soon after that.

Elsewhere, back-rowers Esteban Abadie and Patrick Tuifua, both with knee injuries, will also be missing, RCT announced in a statement, as will centre Oliver Cowie, who has a shoulder problem.

Bad news, however, for Antoine Frisch and Matthias Halagahu. The former needs an operation on a foot and will be out for between 4 and 5 months. The latter, who could have staked a claim for a place in the France squad, has also had foot surgery and will miss several months of action.

Hookers Gianmarco Lucchesi and Mickaël Ivaldi, meanwhile, could return to the Var ranks fairly quickly.