It’s All Happening Thursday At the Adidas Performance Store

Guess where Raymond Domenech will be tomorrow at 1400 hours, Paris time?

He’ll be where all the cool people will be hanging out, at the Adidas Performance Store on the Champs-Elysées, of course. That’s where our Raymond will be announcing The List for France Argentina. (Oh, and how do you say “Adidas Performance Store” in French? “Adidas Performance Store,” of course. Duh. But you have to say it with a French accent.)

So why the Adidas Performance Store? According to Raymond, “I am for decentralization.” Plus he doesn’t want everybody to get bored. And it has nothing whatsoever to do with the publicity. Of course not.

Okay, so who will be on the list? Well, William Gallas and Jean-Alain Boumsong are out for sure, as is Alou Diarra. I’m thinking Lilian Thuram is also.(?) And I don’t think Sylvain Wiltord and Karim Benzema have magically gotten better since I last checked. I also just read that Florent Malouda picked up an injury over the weekend, but he might be playing for Lyon today, so it doesn’t sound too serious. (Crossing fingers. Love Malouda.)

Grégory Coupet will play in goal for sure. Daddy Raymond said so. And I’m thinking his backup will be young, not Barthez.

With all the injuries to the rearguard (and why can I not type that without laughing? oh, ouch, an injured rearguard!I am SO juvenile) there’s some room for creativity on defense. I’m guessing Eric Abidal and Willy Sagnol for sure. And I love Patrice Evra, so I’m hoping he’ll be back. And in the center…. Probably Philippe Mexès . And who knows who else? Sébastien Squillaci? (Because you can’t have too many guys from Lyon.) Pascal Chimbonda? And probably a couple of guys I know very little about?

Midfield will also be interesting. I’m thinking Patrick Vieira, Florent Malouda and Franck Ribéry, and after that it’s anybody’s guess. Sydney Govou, probably. Jérémy Toulalan. Rio Antonio Mavuba maybe. And there’s been some press lately about Lille’s Mathieu Bodmer, so he may be one of the young, new ones Domenech was talking about. I wouldn’t think Domenech would want to dump Claude Makélélé with his defense in the shape it’s in, but I’m also picking up random and totally unsubstantiated rumors that our Claude might have had something to do with that ugly “Thierry Henry is Arrogant” article in December. So maybe in the name of peace and harmony? Nah, probably not.

And what about “attaquants“? This is where my maternal heart breaks. This is Argentina. David Trézéguet’s from Argentina. Trézéguet so wants to play. I so want him to play. I just don’t think it’s gonna happen. I’m thinking Thierry Henry, Djibril Cissé, Nicolas Anelka and Louis Saha, all of whom are having good seasons. Or possibly some new young gun in place of either Anelka or Saha.

But what do I know? We’ll see tomorrow.