RUGBY:FRANCE COACH Marc Lievremont has defended his decision to retain Sebastien Chabal for the RBS Six Nations clash with Italy on Saturday.

Number eight Chabal was expected to be replaced by Biarritz backrow Imanol Harinordoquy after his poor performance in the 17-9 defeat to England last month.

However, Lievremont has kept faith with the Racing Metro star for the trip to the Stadio Flaminio.

“I want to give him playing time. I watched the (England) game again and his display didn’t seem catastrophic to me. Imanol will start against Wales,” said Lievremont. Julien Bonnaire returns to the openside of the scrum in place of Harinordoquy, who drops to the bench.

In the only other changes, full-back Maxime Medard replaces Clement Poitrenaud after recovering from a hamstring injury and veteran prop Sylvain Marconnet replaces Thomas Domingo.

The France coach has not altered the half-back combination of Dimitri Yachvili and Francois Trinh-Duc, with scrumhalf Morgan Parra set to make his second consecutive appearance from the bench.

“Dimitri was a substitute in the last two November Tests and in the first two Six Nations games,” Lievremont added. “He started against England and even though he made a few mistakes, like others, I still trust him . . .Morgan will certainly come off the bench during the game.”

FRANCE: M Medard; Y Huget, A Rougerie, Y Jauzion, V Clerc; F Trinh-Duc, D Yachvili; S Marconnet, W Servat, N Mas, J Pierre, L Nallet, T Dusautoir (capt), J Bonnaire, S Chabal. Replacements: G Guirado, L Ducalcon, J Thion, I Harinordoquy, M Parra, D Traille, C Poitrenaud.