GROUP A/URUGUAY V FRANCE:A HANDFUL of countries always come to events like this with a genuine sense of confidence and those who don't generally do their best to hide their doubts by putting a brave face on things.
Despite having been champions in 1998, though, and only narrowly beaten four years ago by Italy, the French continued to give the impression last night of being a team that has no idea how it will fare over the next few weeks.
Their problems last night might have been overshadowed by those of their opponents, Uruguay, whose flight into Cape Town was delayed by three hours due to a technical fault as well as those encountered by local organisers, who had to deal with several supporters being injured due to overcrowding at the city’s fan zone.
Still, French coach Raymond Domenech and captain Patrice Evra might have been expected to do more than suggest this campaign may be regarded as being more formidable than farcical when they return home.
Evra did briefly attempt to talk up the prospect of the French still being in South Africa come July 11th, but there was a little too much talk about the team’s determination to go down together if they are knocked out.
Domenech’s contribution was a little stranger with the French man replying to a very soft question about the mood within the camp with what appeared to be a remarkably frank admission of nerves.
Asked if he and his players are calm ahead of their opening game, Domenech replied: “I don’t prepare matches with any certainty. I may seem calm but underneath there is something of a storm going on.
“We are ready, perhaps a little aggressive and impatient, but calm is not how I would describe the team’s spirit.”
To judge by their fortunes two years ago in Switzerland, the manner of their qualification for this tournament and their preparations since, that may not be entirely surprising.
However, some of those closest to the squad, most notably Marcel Desailly, have been talking in recent days about a renewed sense of unity amongst a group more famous over the last few years for their bickering rather than their quality of their football.
There is, suggested the former French skipper this week, signs of “happiness and joy,” around the squad, and, as Evra suggests, a sense that “everyone is pulling together”, certainly a prerequisite if the team is to improve on a fairly miserable run of form – one win over Costa Rica by a goal, one draw and two defeats – since the team controversially secured its place at these finals by eliminating the Republic of Ireland.
Asked if he felt the team was even entitled to be here Domenech, having once sidestepped the question, insisted: “We finished second in our group. We won the play-off, the same is true of Uruguay, and so we qualified.
“There are 32 who qualified and they deserve to be here, that is football. At the end, one of them will win and deserve to be champions, the others will not.”
Clearly of more concern to the almost always embattled coach at this stage is whether his side can earn a place in the first of the knockout stages, but he insists nothing will be decided this evening, when he is likely to start with the same line-up (one that includes just six of the side that featured against Ireland last November) and 4-3-3 formation which last week lost to an under-strength China.
That, insists Hugo Lloris, was a warm-up match and they, he argues, “are there to make mistakes. The most important thing,” he continued, “is to do the basics well, to analyse things and make improvements immediately in the next game.”
That might just be enough to get them by this evening against a Uruguayan side that is hugely reliant on the attacking talents of Diego Forlan and Luis Suarez.
The former made his first mark on the tournament yesterday by tweeting his way through the delay to the squad’s flight to Cape Town from Kimberley.
Amongst other things, the Atletico striker angrily pondered whether the same thing would have been allowed to happen to the French.
Some of his Irish followers have, of course, had cause in the not too distant past to ask precisely the same question.
PROBABLE LINE-UPS
FRANCE (4-3-3): Lloris (Olympique Lyon); Sagna (Arsenal), Gallas (Arsenal), Abidal (Barcelona), Evra (Manchester Utd); Gourcuff (Girondins Bordeaux), Toulalan (Olympique Lyon), Malouda (Chelsea); Govou (Olympique Lyon), Anelka (Chelsea), Ribery (Bayern Munich).
URUGUAY (4-4-2): Muslera (Lazio); Lugano (Fenerbahce), Godin (Villarreal), Victorino (Universidad de Chile), M Pereira (Benfica); Perez (AS Monaco), Rios (Penarol), Gonzalez (Levadiakos), A Pereira (Porto); Forlan (Atletico Madrid), Suarez (Ajax Amsterdam).
Referee: Yuichi Nishimura (Japan)
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