Between France and Belgium, a new rivalry or simple mockery between neighbors?

The Blues play their qualification for the quarter-finals on Monday against a vengeful opponent, having not digested the defeat in the semi-finals of the 2018 World Cup.

It’s not just the clash of the Euro round of 16, nor a match between two teams criticized for their performances on the pitch. France-Belgium is also a match animated by a recent rivalry between supporters since the semi-final of the 2018 World Cup, which ended in a narrow victory for Les Bleus (1-0) and the “seum” of Thibaut Courtois.

“I wouldn’t say that the team opposite was better than us. (…) Our strength is football, their strength is defending”reacted the Red Devils goalkeeper to beIN Sports, triggering a wave of mockery on social networks on the French side.

Three years later, a concert of horns in Brussels celebrated France’s elimination in the round of 16 of Euro 2021. Eliminated in the next round of the same tournament, the Belgians had the opportunity to take their revenge in the autumn, in the semi-finals of the Nations League. But after being led 2-0, Karim Benzema, Kylian Mbappé and Theo Hernandez turned the match the other way (3-2), rekindling the resentment of the Belgians whose golden generation was never able to win the long-awaited title.

Obviously questioned about what the France team represents for them, the players of the Belgian selection did not hide their difficulty in digesting even just the 2018 episode. “I remember it very well. I felt a lot of pain like all Belgians. Belgium could and should have won”launched Johan Bakayoko, 21 years old and too young to be on the trip to Russia at the time, but ready to put a coin back into the machine. At the start of the Tour de France, where many Belgians and French people are cohabiting in the peloton, Remco Evenepoel predicted a 4-0 victory for the Red Devils.

On the French players’ side, no one wanted to enter this game. “We’re not going to look down on them”, insisted William Saliba, teammate of Leandro Trossard at Arsenal. If the actors did not blow too much on the embers, mayors and burgomasters of border towns announced the closure of roads linking France and Belgium on Monday evening in order to “prevent possible overflows”. To the point of contradicting the Belgian international Thomas Meunier, for whom this rivalry “always stay good-natured” ?

“Adversity comes more from the Belgiansexplains François Da Rocha Carneiro, a historian specializing in the history of the French team, recalling that the Blues have a 100% tournament victory record against this opponent (5/5). Whether in the World Cup, the Euro or the Nations League, France has always beaten them, sometimes even humiliating them, like at Euro 1984 (5-0) with Michel Platini’s hat-trick.”. To speak of a great rivalry, we must in a sense be “best enemies”. “Belgium is rather the Blues’ favorite opponent, the one they meet most often”analyzes the author of “A History of France in Crampons” (éditions du Détour, 2022).

Monday’s round of 16 will be the 76th meeting between the two teams. For the French team, this total represents almost twice as many official matches as against any other opponent (39 against Italy and Switzerland, joint second). 86% of these matches were played before the end of the 1980s. “This is the first opponent that the Blues met after the First World War, in 1919, when the players had not yet been demobilized. This is the only civilian team encountered in 1919. There were also matches in the interwar period and several played on November 11 in the 1950s-1960s (1954, 1956, 1966)”the historian recalls.

Basically, according to François Da Rocha Carneiro, Belgium is a bit like that playing partner we call when we need to kick the ball: “VSIt is a rivalry that amuses us with Belgian jokes, especially because there is a very great proximity, almost a brotherhood between France and Belgium, which goes back to wars, to common suffering (…). It’s the family meal, we’re going to argue a little, but we’ll see each other the following week.”.