In Düsseldorf,
The French team successfully entered the competition in this Euro 2024 by having without much effort, but by harvesting an incredible number of opportunities, from an Austrian team light years from its usual combative face. However, it will be necessary to avoid crunching so much in front of goal in the future, because the Blues’ future opponents will not all be as weak as the “Das Team”. Kylian Mbappé, author of an incredible miss, left with an injury after receiving a big blow to the nose.
Unrecognizable Austria, not the Blues. If this is what hell looks like, we want to book a suite there for eternity. Renowned for starting the game on fire and harassing the ball carrier like hell, as we sold you before the match, the Austrians did not show much on Monday against the Blues. Their famous gegenpressing quickly transformed into “butcherpressing”, with them multiplying very dirty fouls and collecting two yellows in the first period.
Note that all our predictions did not fall into the limbo of a weak first period since, for their part, the players of the France team were relatively consistent with what was expected of them, namely boring to watch play, as Antoine Griezmann announced upon his arrival at Clairefontaine. And, moreover, as is the tradition of the first matches of the French team in a major competition.
Positioned in a moving 4-3-3, with Mbappé sticking most of the time to the line on the left side – but without ever displaying his speed and his percussion force through dribbling, the fault of a physique which does not follow not (for the moment) – the DD gang is no more upset than Austria. Apart from a Kyks shot deflected by Pentz at the start of the match, we had to wait for a good old csc from the Wöber families to launch this team into its Euro.
Griz-where? Contrary to what he had suggested against Luxembourg and Canada, Didier Deschamps came back to his senses by repositioning Griezmann in the heart of the game, alongside Rabiot and Kanté. For a result unfortunately similar to the last preparation match. Proof that it is not his positioning but his current form that is failing, he who has played more matches with Atlético since August (47) than an NBA team in the regular season? But one of the strengths of this team is its bottomless tank, American pick-up version, when one player is less good, another takes his place.
Rab-Yo! Kant-Hey! And this player is Adrien Rabiot. The Duke. Although he hasn’t played for weeks due to physical problems, the Juve midfielder agreed with DD, who maintained his confidence in him. With an authority that we did not know (at this point), the former Parisian delivered a wild pig performance in the middle. Whether recovering the ball, in the forward projection or in the passing game, short or long, like this sublime opening for a Mbappé guilty in front of the homeland of a failure prohibited by the Geneva convention, Rabiot earned his napkin ring in the XI until the end of the competition.
Grape season in the second half. By aiming a little less at the extreme right of Pentz’s post, Mbappé – out with injury at the end of the match – could have spared his friends a suspenseful end to the match against an incredibly apathetic Austrian team who didn’t ask for that much. To his credit, he was far from being the only one. Despite a shovelful of more or less clear opportunities during a much sexier second period, from Thuram (67th, 82nd) to Koundé (66th, what was that aphid shot, Jules???) via Dembélé and Giroud (90th), the Blues looked like Girondin winegrowers, Monday evening, near Düsseldorf. Fortunately for them, Kanté, also a monster in recovery on Monday evening, was there to sprint from space and tackle the feet of a Wimmer who was heading alone towards goal. On arrival, this missed harvest was without consequence but it should not become a habit.