World Cup 2018: Why France travel to Russia with many unanswered questions
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| France qualified for the World Cup by topping their group, but needed a win in their last game against Belarus to be sure of going to Russia |
As the World Cup beckons, the usual predictions game is in full flow all around the world. Who will win it? Who is your money on?
France have one of the strongest squads in the competition but I'm not sure that many expect them to go all the way.
Head coach Didier Deschamps left big players like Alexandre Lacazette, Kingsley Coman, Adrien Rabiot and Anthony Martial at home, which shows how many options he has at his disposal.
He also lost Dimitri Payet and Laurent Koscielny through injury but their replacements - Nabil Fekir and Adil Rami - are not too bad either.
Yet there seems to be an expectation that France will be beaten at some point in Russia, by Spain, Brazil or Germany.
Despite all the talent they have, despite some clear progress between their 2014 World Cup quarter-final defeat and the Euro 2016 final, they will travel to Moscow on 10 June with more questions than answers.
Is Deschamps the wrong coach? |
| Does Deschamps know his best team? Does he play a formation to get the best out of them? |
There is a recognition in France that Deschamps, as a player and chief, has dependably had fortunes on his side.
Be that as it may, since assuming control over the France group in summer 2012, his favorable luck appears to have betrayed him.
Euro 2016 had his name composed on top of it. In the wake of driving France to a World Cup triumph as commander in 1998, he could have added another section to his legend by managing his nation to another huge title on home soil.
However, in the last against Portugal, Deschamps failed to understand the situation, for the most part being excessively wary regardless of his group being to finish everything.
Has he lost his touch? It is somewhat ahead of schedule to state. The players still believe him yet there have been a couple of different episodes where his choices have been faulty and where his approach has been poor.
He settled on the wrong decisions in a World Cup qualifier in Sweden in June 2017. He chose to begin Blaise Matuidi, Moussa Sissoko and Payet rather than N'Golo Kante, Ousmane Dembele and Kylian Mbappe, who were all in better frame and shape.
Les Bleus lost the amusement and the administrator lost a considerable measure of validity.
Last September in Toulouse, France couldn't beat Luxembourg in a different universe Cup qualifier after Deschamps again got his choice off-base.
His powerlessness to react when Les Bleus discarded a 2-0 lead at home against Colombia to lose 3-2 of every a well disposed in March was additionally concerning.
"I settle on decisions in view of my examination and my perceptions," he said because of the feedback. "I take obligations regarding the players I pick."
Deschamps is under contract until the point when 2020 however he knows how essential this World Cup is. France have their best squad of players since 1998, when he won it. It is the ideal opportunity for him to convey.
Can Pogba be this generation's leader?
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| Pogba and his French team were beaten by Portugal in the Euro 2016 final in Paris |
Through the historical backdrop of French football, the fruitful France groups have dependably made them exceptional on-field pioneer.
Raymond Kopa drove them to third place at the 1958 World Cup. At that point we had the Michel Platini age, with two World Cup semi-finals in 1982 and 1986, and a win at Euro 1984.
At last, in the vicinity of 1998 and 2006, it was Zinedine Zidane's swing to rule and bring more achievement.
The Kopa-Platini-Zidane arrangement needs a beneficiary now, somebody equipped for taking the present France group forward. Furthermore, there is just extremely one hopeful.
"It is Paul Pogba's swing to be in control," says previous Arsenal winger Robert Pires, a colleague of Deschamps in 1998.
"He says he is prepared to play the part and the duty. This is his opportunity. He needs to be the supervisor. He is develop enough now, sufficiently solid to do it.
"For France to win this World Cup, they require Pogba getting it done. He should direct this group, any semblance of Mbappe and Dembele, to the following level.
"He isn't the main pioneer. Hugo Lloris, Raphael Varane, Matuidi and Antoine Griezmann are largely senior figures in this squad too. Be that as it may, Pogba must be the principle man. He was named best youthful player at the last World Cup. He must intend to be named best player of this competition, full stop."
What's more, shouldn't something be said about Mbappe, who moved from Monaco to Paris St-Germain on advance a year ago, with a £166m changeless arrangement set to take after?
Pires supposes it is too soon for the young person, despite the fact that there is little uncertainty the wonder will one day go up against the part.
"He is just 19 years of age - he has a lot of time," included Pires. "It is critical not to put excessively weight on him. This is his first huge rivalry. I trust he will sparkle on the pitch yet it will likewise be a piece of his expectation to absorb information."
Authority has been an issue for France since Zidane resigned after the 2006 World Cup. You can have smart players and solid characters yet to have a genuine pioneer, on and off the pitch, is an alternate issue.
Why has there not been progress since 2016?
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| Deschamps,capped 102 times by France, has been in charge of Les Bleus since 2012, succeeding former team-mate Laurent Blanc |
Euro 2016 was an immense disaster for Deschamps and his men. It should be the opposition that took France back to the best.
The expectations were so high. It was theirs to snatch. So the thrashing in the last against Portugal was a major blow and the headache endured excessively long.
Since 2016, this France group has not enhanced, even in spite of the rise of magnificent abilities like Dembele, Corentin Tolisso and Mbappe.
At the point when the head mentor and the players ought to have ensured they conquered the failure of 2016 and based on the positive things they did at the Euros (beating Germany, Griezmann sparkling), they really disintegrated.
It is possible that they underestimated that they would proceed with their movement or they just thought little of the undertaking ahead.
Is it an absence of aspiration?
For this competition, the target set by the leader of the French Federation, Noel Le Graet, is to achieve the semi-finals. What isn't right with focusing on the title? Why just consider the semis?
The nonattendance of consistency from a portion of the players, the key players particularly, has been an issue.
Strategically, Deschamps is likewise as yet hunting down his best development. Would it be advisable for him to stay with the 4-4-2 that worked in 2016? Or then again is 4-3-3 more suited to this squad and better prepared to win the World Cup?
The head mentor should choose.
There is some confirmation he has proceeded onward from 2016 - he has called up just nine players for the World Cup squad who were there in 2016 (Hugo Lloris, Steve Mandanda, Samuel Umtiti, Adil Rami, Pogba, Kante, Matuidi, Griezmann and Olivier Giroud).
Regardless of whether those progressions are sufficient, we will soon discover.
Can France be inspired by the class of 1998?
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| Many of the current crop of France players were raised on the glory of the victory in 1998 |
Twenty years back, on 12 July, France won the World Cup, on home soil, out of the blue. It has been a long and crooked street as far back as with a few highs (2000, 2006 and 2016) and a great deal of lows (2002, 2004, 2008, 2010).
There is a feeling of fate, be that as it may, which will go to Russia with this French squad.
The greater part of the players called up by Deschamps grew up with the memory of 1998 and the mind blowing France-Brazil last. Mbappe was not by any means conceived when Deschamps lifted the trophy at the Stade de France that mid year yet he has watched the tapes a million times while growing up.
The 1998 age require successors and it may be composed in the stars that the class of 2018 can be precisely that. Desires are high. The weight will be as well.
"It can't be a weight for this age," said World Cup-winning left-back Bixente Lizarazu.
"It ought not be some additional weight that they need to win since we did it 20 years prior. Be that as it may, in the event that they can utilize it as an impetus, it could work.
"Didier has been there previously, he has done it and he will have a ton of guidance for the players, particularly the more youthful ones to manage them through this procedure and take them quite far."
Winning the World Cup 20 years after Zidane would be exceptionally uncommon for Pogba and this France squad.
They have issues to deal with, inquiries to answer and they won't not be at the highest point of the expectations records at the present time.
