A busy afternoon at the office for former Howe man Peter

The former Howe of Fife internationalist and Bell Baxter pupil was part of the Scotland side which went down 27-10 to their hosts.

Horne played form the start in Paris and began at fly half in place of the injured Finn Russell.

France had an early try disallowed by TMO for a deliberate knock on before the ball was grounded, before Horne unfortunately sent a decent-looking kick into the French 22 after 13 minutes which was gathered in plenty of space by fullback Thomas Ramos.

He turned it into a cutting, attacking move and the try was eventually scored by Romain Ntamack, with Ramos converting and then adding a penalty.

Horne then made an impressive advance in 22 minutes before being clattered in a tackle by Guiradot.

A penalty soon followed but captain Greig Laidlaw’s attempt from 31 metres struck the post.

He was successful with another kick a few minutes later to make it 10-3.

Horne later failed in an attempt to take a high ball, which led to another try for France, but this one was also disallowed after a check on video evidence.

Only a couple of minutes into the second half, France scored a legitimate try through Huget and Ramos struck the post with the conversion attempt - after which Horne went off for injury treatment, possibly still from the effects of the Guiradot tackle.

Adam Hastings replaced him at stand-off and Horne came back on in the 52nd minute, in place of Sam Johnson, and played at centre, where he seemed to have better fortunes, although he possibly gave away a penalty following a tackle on Huget.

In 78 minutes, a good attacking move by Scotland saw a Horne pass which enabled Ali Price to gallop through the middle to score Scotland’s only try, which was converted by Hastings.

That made the score 20-10 but France scored another try through Gregory Alldritt - his second of the game - in the seventh minute of stoppage time, which was converted, to make the final score 27-10.

The Scots have a break from Six Nations duty this weekend before returning to meet Wales on March 9 before then facing England.

• In the women’s Six Nations match in Lille, Nicola Howat was on from the start, playing at lock forward (number five).

She was replaced in the second row after 52 mins by Jodie Rettie but the commentators and summarisers on BBC ALBA said she had had a good game and contributed well to Scotland’s efforts up to that point.

France won 41-10, which was a bit rough scoreline-wise on the Scots but the hosts probably deserved their victory.