A semi-final and that’s it. That’s the record of the French team in this Euro 2024. And that’s perhaps the limit of Didier Deschamps’ football. The coach of the Blues had been very clear about the criticisms of the team’s play and its style.We have popular support at the stadium and more than 10 million viewers at each match. I think that if people don’t like what they see, they change the channel, it’s easier at home, he said at a press conference.” A response that had caused a stir at a time when the international press, just like the French press (The Team (talking about a shipwreck this Wednesday morning), had tackled the Blues despite qualifying for the last four.
After the match against Portugal, Chris Sutton, commentator on the BBC had for example said: “If France were playing in my garden, I would close the curtains so as not to see them play”. This Tuesday, against Spain, the French team was outclassed and therefore went out the back door without ever having made an impression in this competition. And the international press savored this elimination of a team that was too unspectacular. “A defeat could mean the end of Didier Deschamps’ non-football career” writing The Guardian in its pages this Wednesday morning. “On a scorching night in Munich, France finally found a way to entertain the world at this European Championship. It turns out that France’s defeat is very captivating indeed. Especially when the game’s defining figure is a supercharged 16-year-old whose entire presence seems to express not just elite talent but lightness, fun, creativity. France never played like a pre-tournament favorite in their six games in Germany. France froze, and became obsolete.”
France didn’t make anyone dream
Even the Argentinian press, which was busy with the Copa America semi-final between its national team and Canada, did not fail to criticize the Blues. “Spain eliminated a French team that tried to attack a minimum, a different face from the one shown since the start of the Euro” writing Olé Diary while TyC Sport is a little more factual: “Spain eliminates a boring French team”. Same observation for the media Globe who speaks of a French team which “was looking for a draw” in this semi-final. But the South American press is not the only one to have pinned the French team in recent hours, it is also the case in Europe. The neighboring countries of the Blues did not fail to sting the French team in their own way.
On the Italian side, the Sports Gazette believes France are leaving the Euro after being a sad place to watch. “France is leaving a Euro in which it has shown itself to be so grey and not very ‘blue’. (…) France, the new fortress of European football? As soon as the level was raised to the maximum, the Bastille Wall became a small wall.” For BILD, “as in the whole of the European Championship, the French team remained too inoffensive offensively against Spain”. Even the Belgian press has made its remarks since DH Sports+ evokes a French team which has especially made headlines in this Euro for “his brazen defense” than for his spectacular game. This elimination of the Blues therefore seems to delight almost everyone. Because in this semi-final, the best simply won.
