Thoughts on Le Sélectionneur, Raymond Domenech: Is he the right man to turn it around, or is his sacking ridiculously overdue?

2006 World Cup Qualifying zidane won the group, because the french team was crap and ray had to recall zzou out of retirement.

“France’s 6-0 victory over Serbia”
your joking
pantelic, vidic, sulejmani, kuzmanovic, zigic, stankovic…. will destroy france.
serbia 2 france 0

I adore Domenech. He should be granted a lifetime appointment.

I wanted ‘le selectionneur” out after the 1-0 loss to Scotland last year when we where 3rd in the group. I wouldnt give credit to Domenech for wc06 and the getting through qualifications,
all the credit should be given to Zizou, Make, and Tutu.

That 1-0 loss to Scotland in France was a really low point – very painful.

If Zidane, Makalele, and Thuram did well for France, then the manager should get some credit for selecting them.

I tend to give the manager credit for good performances and good results, and blame for bad performances and bad results, especially considering the depth of players available to bring into the team.

Jeff- it doesnt take much of a genious to select Zidane and company for an international game

Looking at it all laid out like that, the only really good results are the run in the WC and the 3-1 against Italy. Otherwise it’s mostly just poor draws and losses, or pedestrian wins. It makes me think that Domenech had a bit of luck in the WC.

True, although Domenech did go to Spain to visit Zidane, I beleive, to ask him to come back in person. Domenech could have been stubborn and never tried. Also, Zidane’s form with Real Madrid was up and down a bit, so it wasn’t necessarily a guarantee that he would play well for France, BUT – Zidane, more than any other player I’ve seen, really raises his game for big international matches. In that quarterfinal against Brazil he was out of this world.

jdkbrown – Welcome to my world.

Yeah, it’s gotta be the two Scotland losses that did it for me. IMO he was invisible at the WC and Zidane ran the team. I exercised patience with him throughout the process and avoided criticizing him because of his selection of RIbery and the dividends it paid (tying the score minutes before the half in a must win game against Spain) and Zidane’s genius (has nothing to do with him but at least he was able to recognize it) which helped postpone the melt downs the team would later have during the Euro qualification.
I won’t take anything back even if we win 6-0. The team has shown no consistency since 2006 and yes that is measurable. He was handed the #1 team in the world in 2004 and has somehow managed to completely make a meal out of things.

Bringing in Ribery was one of his good decisions, and of course bringing back Zidane. There haven’t been enough of them, though, for me, and the Ribery decision was so painfully obvious; Domenech was just about the last person to figure it out.

The things that he has in the works now: Toulalan running midfield, Henry and Benzema partnered up front; some of these things could still work out, but he needs things to start clicking immediately.

Furthermore, how many players have prematurely retired because of him? Two??? How many fit players has he black listed??? Three or four? Even marginal players like Malouda are coming forward and expressing their disapproval of the Domenech way. Sign of the times.

He’s had two years to figure out the Benz/Henry thing out. I appreciate what you’re trying to do Jeff and I agree with Toulalan being a positive but I think the problem lies with his tactics not player selection. France is blessed with world class talent so he never really has to look far to find it. Putting together a solid game plan is where he has totally failed.

@ french fans
did you guys know serbian striker nikola zigic is 2.02-meter(6-foot, 7 1/2-inch) tall.

no. is he good?

He’s slow to figure stuff out.

What are his tactics or his game plan? Other than choosing a formation, I can’t really discern a plan – which might be the problem. For the Austria game, was it the plan for Diarra to try all those long passes over the top, none of which worked?

I’m far from the camp that thinks another loss or two is worth it to see the back of Domenech, and I’m not in the camp that believes that any of the candidates who have been touted would necessarily bring instant improvement, so I’m hoping that things will turn themselves around, that Doms will stumble onto a system that works.

A big win is what’s need to get the confidence rolling.

I’m more of the camp that once supported Domenech for having the stones to draw a line in the sand and say “this is my team”. Today that team doesn’t work. For awhile it hasn’t. I’m in the camp thats tired of barely qualifying for tournaments, countless draws, losing because of weak attacking,losing because of weak defending, winning on penalties to teams we should be blowing out,etc, etc…

@ JM
on wednesday he will be

Im thinking the team will rebound with a 2-0 victory.
lets stay positive.

the tactics plan against austria that went wrong was constantly playing things in the air when
austria’s defense compacted. Austrians r big and tall, and it shounld take a genius to have quick passing and piercing runs into the center from the flanks from ppl like nasri, or play the through balls to henry. Domenech doesnt do that, he wants a slow buildup to attacks, with the defense nice and organized before launching an attack.
This is the difference between Domenech and an attacking coach like Wenger. This type of style is what we need imo.

If Serbia defeats France, the entire FFF should resign. While I believe in the qualities of my team, history tells for itself – Serbia nor Yugoslavia (from 1992 onward) have never defeated any of the world superpowers. True, we’re also not losing so easily in the qualifiers: in the last three competitions Serbia hasn’t lost a singe game agaist two of the main contenders, and we played games against Portugal, Spain and Italy. I’ll be writing a game preview at the Serbia WCB, you might check it out if you’re interested in what’s going on in the enemy’s camp and look at the game from a different perspective.

I feel @ this point does it matter if they win, as long he is the coach they will loose soon enough,I would after the game fire him NO ONE WILL OBJECT France can be a super power again…………..allez Deschamps

This is just speculation but …

… I’m not sure we can blame Domenech for the current state of the French NT.

If this team were really his team, if he was the one making key decisions, he would have been fired last July. I suspect he does what he’s told–by the FFF, by Escaletes, and is perhaps something of a puppet for them. After all, they voted something like 18-2 to keep him on. Clearly, something else was at work that had not much to do with his abilities.

That may be the only reason for having maintained him.

If so, crying for Domenech’s head is futile. The rot lies deeper: with Escalates and the FFF itself.

I think we will know this when Domenech is let go–inevitably, before or after the upcoming Romania game–and the FFF puts in his place someone relatively untested and whom they can control like Boghossian or someone more independent like Deschamps.

I agree with jdkbrown’s remark earlier. I think Domenech’s best result was the 3-1 against Italy; and even then, you feel that the sheer desire for vengeance from the team did the job there. France got to the WC final in 2006 because Zidane was on another skill planet for the second half of the tournament (and Make and Tutu of course). I never felt like it was Raymond’s coaching ability.

The ideal situation now would be that France wins against Serbia and that regardless of the win, RD gets the sack, nom de dieu. But that’s not so likely. I’ll get back to my Heineken and daydreaming…

Incidentally, l’Equipe is alleging that the FFF kept with Domenech because they absolutely did not want anyone from the outside (Deschamps)or to bow to the media/98 lobby. To me Deschamps is the obvious choice for a million reasons…

It’s interesting to look at the stats Jeff has provided …

… what worked for France—however often dismal to watch—is not working now: defense.

France gave up only two goals in ten games during the WC06 qualifiers …

Even in the Euro08 qualifiers France gave up only five goals in twelve games.

In its last four games (the Sweden friendly included) France has allowed eleven goals.

Excellent thread.

metamoralia, I thought your speculation was absolutely fascinating and opened up a new line of thinking for me–Domenech being a puppet of the FFF, following their orders re team selection/tactics.

I know precious little about Domenech’s work with the youth teams in terms of style and tactics, just superficial stuff I read in various press articles. Is there any substantial difference between his approach with the senior team v. the youth team?

Hi Sandrahan,

Your question is very interesting, and while I wish I could offer an informed comment, I just don’t know–my deep interest in the French NT (and in football, in general) goes back only a few years. In my readings, I’ve not seen anything about that at all.

Jeff had something above to say about Domenech and the youth team. Perhaps he, or some other contributors, might comment on your question.

I just wiki’d Domenech, and see he was the u-21 coach from ‘93-’04. I had no idea he was there for that long.

• 1994: Losing semi-finalists. Finished fourth.
• 1996: Losing semi-finalists. Finished third.
• 1998: Did not qualify. Finished 2nd of 5 in qualification group.
• 2000: Did not qualify. Finished 1st of 5 in qualification group. Lost qualification play-off.
• 2002: Runners-up.
• 2004: Did not qualify. Finished 1st of 5 in qualification group. Lost qualification play-off.

I don’t know if he was the coach at the time of 2004 tournament, but I add it anyway … His teams did either very well, but never winning anything—or not well at all, which if nothing else seems to mirror his time with the NT!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Domenech

hey michel-olivier! why are you being such a .. and why did you compare france football team to england football team? france is not overrated – in fact most of the world under rates it after the bad oaching. England is very much overrated – most of the ‘golden generation’ don’t even shine for their clubs..

Wow that are interesting and impressing analyses in the comments!! things i never could think of
- im impressed:D

and upset because france is playing crap with a crap coach

lets look to the match with the serbs tomorrow

If you got this channel: EuroSport 1
You can watch France – Austria
Not live, but it is something else than Justin TV

On the plus side, our U-21 team qualified for the playoffs! YEAH!

To metamoralia, excellent thinking. I did not describe it as well as you did, though earlier, during the summer and before the July general counsel, I described Domenech as a bit of a “made man,” like in the mafia. He is persona grata at the FFF, and it would take, well, A LOT for Escalettes (there are people who think Escalettes will resign if we don’t win tomorrow) to get rid of him. Of course, we are now in a situation where everyone’s head is close to the guillotine, though there’s no doubt it’s Estelle Denis’ main squeeze who would be on the chopping block first.

Michel-Olivier, I’m impressed at your knowledge of Serbian players. I’m actually more afraid of the Serbian midfield, as I think a midfield of Stankovic, Kuzmanovic, Jankovic, etc. is definitely one which, considering we’re without Vieira, could make considerable problems to our own. Zigic will be a danger on set pieces, to be certain, though.

Wow that are interesting and impressing analyses in the comments!! things i never could think of
- im impressed:D
and upset because france is playing crap with a crap coach
lets look to the match with the serbs tomorrow
If you got this channel: EuroSport 1
You can watch NOT France – Austria,
but France – Serbia
Not live, but it is something else than Justin TV so check out your old american tv;s

i wonder what the line up will be tommorow though with domenech it wont be surprising

Some thoughts after analyzing the performance of our U-21 team today and whether any of those guys will have an impact on qualification.

Even though he is out injured at the moment, it is more than likely that PSG’s Mamadou Sakho (who is surclassé, that is, while he should be a U-19, he’d in the U-21 Bleuet team) will be a starter in Bleu, though if they don’t rush him, about 3 years, and he’ll be among the best defenders in the world.

Habib Bellaïd, if he can be more consistent, also has a shot.

Loïc Rémy is able to pose issues to any defense.

Frédéric Nimani has done well this season, he remains very unpolished, though.

Erick Mombaerts should not be among the candidates to replace Raymond Domenech, as we appear to be having the same issues with his teams (difficulty to score, questionable selections, and so on).

You should go to the l’ Equipe web site. They released transcripts of the deliberations at the FFF and why they decided to keep Domenech. It’s all about politics, not wanting somebody from “outside” (like Deschamps) to take over, using Domenech as the “fall guy” in case the team doesn’t qualify for WC. Absolutely putrid stuff. They should all be fired: Houllier, Escallettes, and the rest of those clowns.

Benj, do you have a link? Unless I catch something while it’s on the front page of the l’Equipe website, I always have a hard time searching out articles there. Thanks!

Laurie

can’t find the link anymore on lequipe.fr. It seems to have disappeared…
However, here is a link from LeMonde referring to it:

http://www.lemonde.fr/sports/article/2008/09/09/pourquoi-domenech-est-maintenu-a-la-tete-des-bleus_1093390_3242.html

Here’s an even better one:

http://www.lemonde.fr/sports/article/2008/09/09/un-fusible-nomme-raymond-domenech_1093019_3242.html

bring back the guillotine because someone(you know who) head is going to be on the scaffolding.

i think a little prayer for our boys is appropriate at this stage.

ribery is training again and should be good as new end of september, so we will def have him back for the next set of internationals! Thtas something good to look for before our inevitable loss to (is it) serbia