“Le Magicien” underlined his reputation as the best rugby player on the planet with an imperious performance in France’s dismantling of Wales in their Six Nations opener last weekend. Can England avoid a similar fate on Saturday? Here, Telegraph Sport’s finest rugby minds tackle Steve Borthwick’s Antoine Dupont conundrum.

‘Mark him with three defenders’

Gavin Mairs: When England faced the prospect of coming up with a defensive strategy to stop Jonah Lomu before the 1995 World Cup semi-final, a sense of collective pride meant that no one could admit they might need help tackling the great man. And look how that worked out. Stopping Dupont is arguably an even more daunting challenge because the threats Dupont poses are multifold.

Pre-emptive work is key here. The England defenders are going to have to run and run all afternoon, more often than not chasing shadows to track his trail line to limit his offloading game. While the team of ’95 went one-on-one on Lomu, England may consider marking Dupont with three defenders to force him to make a decision on the back foot and without space. And keep their fingers crossed.

‘Bolster the fringe defence – urgently’

Charlie Morgan: For an idea of how tricky this is going to be, Dupont has not lost a XV-a-side fixture as a starting scrum-half since the quarter-final of the 2023 World Cup. Toulouse have suffered three defeats with him in the team over that period, but only when their extraterrestrial superstar has been either a replacement or their starting fly-half. With him wearing No 9, Dupont’s sides have been invincible. His personal return this season is 11 victories from 11 outings.

Short of switching his shirt for a different number, England will need to bolster their fringe defence as a non-negotiable priority. New Zealand, Australia, South Africa and now Ireland have all picked them apart in that area over the past three months. I would ask burly tacklers such as George Martin, Maro Itoje and Tom Willis to stand tall and stop the offloading game that allows France to flood through.

Against Wales, as highlighted in an excellent video by Tim Cocker on his Eggchasers YouTube channel, Dupont ducked behind dummy runners before delivering a trademark kick-pass to Théo Attissogbé. Highlighting that habit to the officials and hoping to milk a penalty would be a start. In reality, to oust him and France, England will have to be extremely accurate and alert as a collective for the entire game. Living right on the edge at the breakdown, shoving anyone over the ball to mess up Dupont’s platform, is another marginal gain.

Another left-field strategy would be asking the assistant referees to wear dark blue. That seemed to be the explanation for Dupont’s early brain fade against Wales, when he sent a chip directly into touch a long way from any viable recipient. It was such a jarring error that witnesses were open-mouthed. Dupont simply shrugged. He did not look fallible for much longer.

‘Lock him on the bus’

Ben Coles: Two days after suggesting on the Telegraph Rugby Podcast that the best approach might be to just lock Dupont on the team bus, I am not sure if I have a better proposal. Think about all of the incredible things you have seen Dupont do on the field for France and Toulouse. Now consider this – have you ever seen him escape a locked vehicle? Exactly.

Make sure it is one of those fancy buses with a television so he at least knows what is happening in the match, and also provide him with some snacks. The game should sound great from the west car park.

‘Slow down the breakdown – illegally’

Charles Richardson: Ben’s above suggestion would, in fairness, achieve the goal of stopping Dupont at Twickenham. But the match that sticks out in my mind with Dupont at his most impotent is that World Cup quarter-final loss to South Africa, where the Springboks did a fantastic job, for the most part, of restricting France’s gain-line success and also of slowing down their breakdown. Admittedly, on this latter point, it was not exactly all legal – much to Dupont’s dismay after the match – but that is part of the art.

‘The back row must be merciless’

James Corrigan: Short of employing “Suzie” – the mystical South African waitress who some in New Zealand still blame for poisoning the All Blacks before the 1995 World Cup – to whip up a plate of escargot, there is only one way to stop him. Your forwards need to be dominant, your back-rowers need to be rapid and merciless and he must be placed so squarely on the back foot that he will wobble just like any scrum-half under siege – superhuman or not. There is no great secret to it.

And finally...

Tom Cary: Could always get him to take a South Western train to the game.