The shattered dream of the Finns on Tuesday night, after the defeat against the France team (2-0), did not prevent the Blues from celebrating their victory, the very last of 2021. A success that has just ended a year that the France team finished unbeaten, a first since 2011. And by equaling the record of 27 games in a row without defeat in official competition, a series started in June 2019 in Turkey (0-2), the Blues have once again made an almost perfect evening.
In view of the current context, from the victory in the League of Nations in October to this success against Finland via a qualification acquired for the 2022 World Cup by slapping Kazakhstan on Saturday night at the Parc des Princes (8-0), l he year 2021 of the France team looks like a fairy tale. Add to it the images of a stratospheric Kylian Mbappé in recent weeks, of a Karim Benzema delighted to find the Blues and the smiles of the newcomers in the selection, and this calendar year of the France team has everything of a year successful.
It would be forgetting the first six months. Monday, November 8, when his players arrived at Clairefontaine for the start of the rally, Didier Deschamps refused to take stock of the Blues over the year. Before doing it anyway. “There were young players who came. I had to make changes to the organization of the team. By removing the ten minutes of distraction this summer, there have been a lot of good things so far, with a significant contribution from the pitch“, explained the coach.
The “ten minutes of distraction“evoked by Deschamps obviously refer to this France-Switzerland (3-3, 4-5 tab) from June 28 to the Euro, when the Blues seemed to have things in hand at 3-1 before sinking in the last moments They will never have seen the quarterfinals and St. Petersburg, a ball that is a good spot for a world champion team and which obviously tarnishes the results of this year 2021.
“It’s a year where there were three goals, one was missed. We won the League of Nations and the second was to get this qualification“Repeated Deschamps in recent days. Two out of three, it’s not so bad. But even before the failure of the Euro, the first months of the France team had been mixed, with victories small arms at the start of the World Cup qualifying campaign in Kazakhstan (2-0) and Bosnia (1-0).
In retrospect, one of the greatest successes of this year 2021 has something to do with it. The reinstatement of Karim Benzema in Blue, just before approaching the Euro, seemed a bit late. An observation made by Olivier Giroud on several occasions during his recent media tour, he who suffered the return of the Real Madrid striker to the France team: “This recall created a tactical imbalance at the team level and in the way we play. […] The France team was able to overcome this problem of tactical adaptation long afterwards. We have seen it especially with the League of Nations. But it took a long time.“
27 – France are unbeaten in their last 27 competitive matches (19 wins, 8 draws), tying their best streak dating from 1994-1999. The Blues have also scored in their last 18 matches (including friendlies), equaling their record set between 1999 and 2000. Party. pic.twitter.com/7ewS4Ouqpw
– OptaJean (@OptaJean) November 16, 2021
Time has paid off and the last four games have proven that the technical relationship between Mbappé and Benzema is one of the great lessons of 2021 for the Blues. But the wait will have been long and the procrastination of the France team as well as the disappointment at the Euro have necessarily put Didier Deschamps on the front of the stage, him the coach already present for nine years, an eternity for a position also exposed.
His arrival at a press conference after the draw against Hungary at the Euro on June 19 (1-1), when he thought the microphones were not yet on, spoke volumes about the difficulties encountered by the Blues at this time of year: “I will get fucked hard. “But the coach, like his players after the failure of the Euro, has reinvented himself to end the year 2021 brilliantly.
After a disappointing comeback in September against Bosnia (1-1) and Ukraine (1-1), Deschamps managed to turn the tide by agreeing to bring freshness to the group with new players (Aurélien Tchouaméni, Theo Hernandez, Moussa Diaby, Jordan Veretout) and create an imbalance in his team to bring his attacking trio closer.
The machine, well led by the Mbappé-Benzema duo, reached the peaks in the victory in the League of Nations in October, after relaunching at Groupama Stadium in Lyon against Finland on September 7 (2-0). She finished her year perfectly on Tuesday, against the same Finland, but on the side of Helsinki. Only a few days after a qualification obtained at the Parc des Princes, qualified as “most important moment“of the playoffs by Deschamps.
And if there is one thing to remember from 2021, despite elimination in the round of 16, it is ultimately what the coach kept repeating during this gathering: “The France team is still one of the best European and world nations.“Bodes well for 2022, with the culmination of a World Cup to be kept at the end of the year (November 21-December 18, 2022). It promises.