France 0, Belgium 0 – Everything’s in place for France, but players need 5% improvement

November 15th, 2011 | by: jeff | View Comments

The Stade-de-France crowd booed at full time, but this team is miles ahead of the Domenech sides from around 2007 through 2010 that were so poor to watch.

I’m a big fan of the current team, but to be winners, we need a little bit more quality from these players.

Did anyone catch the England-Spain friendly? The 1-0 England victory runs counter to my point, but I won’t let that stop me. Spain looked brilliant (other than not scoring), and England looked just about as poor as they’re typically described in the English press (aside from winning the match). Spanish players tended to have a brilliant touch and fantastic ball control, English players tended to blur the line between attempted close-control and short-range passing. (I exaggerate. Slightly.)

France is somewhere in between right now. Yes, we could win something like England in that friendly, or Greece in Euro 2004, with solid defending and a goal against the run of play, but our probability of success would be greatly increased, I believe, if the players could up their game just a little bit, and bend the ball to their will.

For me, the issue is ball control. Everything else is in place: great athleticism, commitment, spirit, intelligence, discipline, formation, tactics. The one thing that wasn’t in place against Belgium tonight was mastery of the ball. For every great touch, there was a poor one. We just weren’t sharp enough, but the optimist in me believes we could be. We have been, at times: our own friendly against England, the qualifier away to Romania when the pitch was falling apart. I had the impression, at least, in those matches that we’re much closer to the Spanish technique than we were tonight against Belgium.

I’ve thrown out “5%” as the required improvement to represent my view that we’re close to being a team that looks like a potential winner, and to represent my view that Blanc is doing his part.

Here’s how we lined up:

Benzema
Ribery Martin Remy
M’Vila Cabaye
Abidal Sakho Rami Reveillere
Lloris

M’Vila went off injured, carried off on a stretcher with his neck in a brace. It looked like they were being really cautious. Blanc said afterwards, according to L’Equipe, that the issue is with the neck, and that early reports are that it’s not too serious. It was a bad fall, but if anyone can recover quickly, I would expect it to be Yann.

Maxime Gonalons was a like-for-like replacement for M’Vila, and he did ok.

Sakho had a great game – his first for France. He was the pick of the defenders.

Martin was a little disappointing, which he acknowledged after the match (again from L’Equipe). Getting the best out of him is one issue for Blanc to ponder. It can’t have as much impact as the players spending every free moment refining their loving first touch and magnetic ball control, but it’s at least something for Blanc’s list of things to do.

Remy and Menez have a healthy competition for that right-forward spot. The formation was like this at times:

Ribery Benzema Remy
Martin Cabaye
Abidal M’Vila Revelliere
Sakho Rami
Lloris

Abidal and Reveillere appeared to be under instructions to play high up the pitch. They were trying to release Ribery and Remy. This often cut Martin out of the play. Remy’s goals should guarantee him a spot in the team for the big tournament in the summer, and Menez looked lively when he came on. Several players have auditioned for that spot on the right – it looks like it’s down to two, or maybe three with Nasri, who missed this match and the USA friendly through injury.

While the tactics, and the broken down moves, took Martin out of the match, Cabaye was still able to see a lot of the ball, and played well. Cabaye, Remy, Menez, and Sakho are all players who seem to be improving quickly. It’s enough to give me some optimism for the Euros. Debuchy, Koscielny, and Jeremy Mathieu all looked promising against the US. Sagna and Mexes are still to come back from injury. Gourcuff could force his way back.

And Ribery and Benzema seem to like playing together, so that’s also promising.

That might be it for France blogging for a while. The next match is a friendly against Germany in February, I believe. If a lack of posting is having any negative repercussions for anyone, let me know in the comments, and I might chime in with something. I’ll throw up something if I see any interesting news of relevance, or if I’m in my cups, but otherwise, lurkers, enjoy your winter holidays, and Allez Les Bleus.