The game: We waited (like them)
We expected the classic eleven of the Blues. We got it. Since the beginning of the week, we had tended to reduce this shock to an opposition between two men in a corridor, the left. Wrongly. Because not much happened between Mbappé and Walker. Because we had the impression, too, of living a long round of observation after the kick-off. And then, Aurélien Tchouaméni came out of his box. His praline of the right put the Blues in a favorable position but in a wait-and-see situation, 2018 style. Less solid than four years ago, DD’s men were punished for having forgotten to push the English. And we ended up wondering if they could get away with it. It happened, on a kick from Grizou for Giroud. The rest is literature.
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Another half: Enjoy, it’s fantastic!
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The players: Griezmann – Lloris, the bosses
Jostled as rarely by tough Englishmen, the Blues were able to count on a great Hugo Lloris and an increasingly tall Antoine Griezmann. On the evening of his 143rd selection, the doorman released a string of stops and Grizou reigned over the middle. Théo Hernandez suffered, Kylian Mbappé went through the evening like a shadow but the France team got away with it.
The X Factor: The Weight of History
Harry Kane could have killed two birds with one stone. He should have. After having equalized from the penalty spot and having equalized Wayne Rooney (53 goals in selections), the Tottenham striker had the opportunity to pass, to change the destiny of England and to put his people up to the Blues. And then, against his mate Hugo Lloris, his second penalty of the evening flew away in the clouds at the Al Bayt stadium. punished. Doubly.
Harry Kane
Credit: Getty Images
Tweet: Yeah…
The declaration: Didier Deschamps (French team)
“It’s wonderful to still be able to reach the last four. We want to suspend time a bit. Tonight, we’re going to enjoy, there’s quality in this team, but there’s also a mentality and a state of We are perhaps a little happy, but it is we who give them the ammunition with these two penalties but it is with hearts and guts that we held this small goal in advance.
The question: But how did they get away with it again?
The Blues have won a game they could have lost. And, for a while, we said to ourselves that it would not necessarily have been undeserved. Because they have long refused the fight and have rested on their old achievements of 2018, without really having the means. Faced with the English who were more afraid of losing than the desire to scalp the world champions, they ended up getting out of it. This is not the time for grand speeches. No need to deliver a tactical analysis which would not, in any case, reveal what we saw on the meadow on Saturday evening.
A football match never (or rarely) resembles what is expected of it. We imagined fire on the sides, transitions and goals. We had goals, three, but not a lot of fire along the chalk, because Mbappé hovered around Walker for a long time, because Dembélé didn’t push much more, and we finally saw a game played with the brake at hand, from which the world champions emerged victorious.
One would almost want to speak of force of habit, symbolized by the second goal, brought to Olivier Giroud on a set by his old friend Antoine Griezmann. Griezmann – Giroud, as in 2016. Six years later, when the boat is rocking, when the star Mbappé is in a day without, Didier Deschamps knows he can count on his old internationals, his grognards. Old people, young people, talent, gnac, experience: this team has an incomparable toolbox. And, so far, there is always one that works.
“Under Deschamps, there had never been such a miracle in a tournament”
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