L’Equipe’s Expected Starters for France vs. Morocco

L’Equipe is saying that Jérémy Toulalan may play tomorrow. Oy. Look at this picture from the fff site. Does this look like a healthy player?

In good news, our Barcelona boys have arrived at Clairefontaine and all seem to be healthy and uninjured. Thierry Henry played the match on Tuesday and scored a goal, Eric Abidal played only twenty minutes or so, and Lilian Thuram didn’t play. (Not great for him, but at least he should be rested for our games, right?) Titi and Eric got the day off yesterday, but Lilian participated fully in training.

L’Equipe also lists the following as expected starters:
Landreau - Sagna, Thuram, Gallas, Abidal - Makelele, Toulalan (ou L. Diarra), Ribéry, Ben Arfa (ou Rothen) - Henry, Benzema.

I think I’m comfortable with all of these, but right back and defensive midfield still make me a little nervous

I’ll be posting possibilities for watching the games later today. And this will include the Scotland-Italy game for those of us masochistic enough to want to see a park-the-bus-in-front-of-goal nil-nil draw. (Am I wrong here? I’d be thrilled to be wrong.)

Bob the World Cup Blog editor sent me the following excerpt to prepare me for the game:

In Italy, the number 17 is considered unlucky. Some Alitalia planes have no row 17, some Italian hotels have no room 17 and in Roman numerals XVII is an anagram of VIXI which translates into “I have lived” with the implication “my life is over” or “I am dead”.

Italy play Scotland in a crucial Euro 2008 qualifier at Hampden Park on Saturday, 17 November with kick-off at 1700 GMT - for the record, Italy have won four of their 11 matches played on the 17th of a month in the last 30 years. (Various)

So brace yourselves, folks. I don’t think Italy is going to help us out. I believe it will be all up to France on Wednesday.

(Thanks to Inara for the photo link.)