Rugby sevens: France’s Antoine Dupont treasures gold medal moment after ending Fiji’s undefeated Olympic streak

It was a monumental gold medal moment for France at the Olympic Games Paris 2024 as a gamble paid off and the host nation ended Fiji’s Olympic reign in front of nearly 70,000 electric fans in the Stade de France on Day 1 of the Games (27 July).

The scoreboard read 7-7 at the break and the crowd was on the edge of their seats as it looked like it could be anyone's game, until French star Antoine Dupont stepped on to the field for the second half after making no appearance in the first.

As if he had to further prove his place as one of the greatest players the sport has ever seen, he scored two tries before setting up a third in the final seven minutes, leaving Fiji in the dust 28-7.

“It’s such a great honour to win this title and I have such great emotions. It’s hard to describe. It is such a great thing to achieve with these boys. It’s really top of the list,” said Dupont, before adding: “We worked so hard for so long to do this. This is just the cherry on the cake.”

It was risk after risk that paid off for Dupont and the French, as the star player bowed out of the Six Nations tournament to put all of his effort and energy into bringing Olympic victory home in the sport for the very first time.

It was also quite the underdog story, as the nation failed to even qualify for Tokyo 2020, but came back to refuse anything but the gold in front of their home crowd, including none other than the President of France, Emmanuel Macron.

As the final whistle was blown, the sound from the audience was deafening and the team secured the host nation its first gold medal of the Games.

French head coach Jerome Daret said: “We want to put rugby sevens in our country on the map. We went to Fiji to learn how to do that, and we need to say thank you to Fiji for teaching us such a lot about this sport.

“[Dupont] is the most important player. He made us reach 200 per cent of our potential and gave rugby sevens the opportunity to be in the spotlight on the world stage.

The bronze-medal match reached comparable levels of excitement as the Australians blew their 7-5 lead at the break to fall to South Africa 26-19.

“Honestly, I don’t have words. A lot of people didn’t give us a chance. We only qualified for the Games by repêchage, and if someone had said then, ‘You will be standing on the podium at the end’, I never would have believed them,” said South Africa’s Ryan Oosthuizen after the match.

“We had an argument after day one about our standards. But we came together and said, ‘We have to fight for South Africa’. We are defiant people. And we did it. I am so glad.”

This concluded the men’s rugby sevens competition and the women’s will begin 28 July.

Rugby sevens: men's podium

Gold: France

Silver: Fiji

Bronze: South Africa