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| June 2, 2002 | Sunday | Rabi-ul-Awwal 20,1423 |
France wakes up with collective hangover
PARIS, June 1: France woke up with a collective hangover on Saturday morning following the previous day’s sobering start to their World Cup title defence against Senegal.
As supporters of the 1998 champions attempted to drown their sorrows in the French capital’s cafes there was to be found at the same time genuine admiration for the unscheduled 1-0 winners from west Africa.
“Senegal deserved to beat us,” said one resigned fan. “We weren’t at our best. Zidane’s absence didn’t help, we really need him back in the team fast!”
In stark contrast to the scenes of mass jubilation that greeted their 3-0 defeat of Brazil four years ago Paris was in subdued mood on Friday night, although in the Bastille area a group of Senegalese supporters draped in their national flag were savouring their stunning victory in style.
France, one of the pre-tournament favourites, now have a battle on to make the second phase.
The president of the French Football Federation, Claude Simonet, did little to lighten the country’s mood when he told AFP that “it would be better if star player Zinedane Zidane only plays in the third (group) match” against Denmark.
Coach Roger Lemerre said France must win against Uruguay and Denmark on June 11 after Senegal wrecked his plans by scoring a surprise goal through French-based player Pape Bouba Diop.
“I knew that my friend Bruno Metsu had concocted a plan, we knew about it the day before the match - a 4-5-1 formation with a packed-out midfield, which is quite normal.
“We had no collective or individual solution to be able to score. And when you don’t score in a match your team is vulnerable.”
As the party went on in west Africa the defeat was greeted with dismay by the French press.
“Worrying” said the headline in the Parisien daily which called the World Cup debutants’ victory “a clap of thunder for world football”.
“The most worrying thing was not the defeat of ‘les Bleus’, it was the fact that their opponents embodied more of the dynamic playing style and the sense of celebration that the World Cup is all about,” said an editorial.
Sports daily L’Equipe mimicked a choking cockerel on its front page before launching into a downbeat assessment of the prospects of the French.
“We fear that yesterday we saw the truth of the fortnight to come,” it said.
“The fact that they seemed incapable of putting pressure on their opponents in a match of this importance raises real concerns,” it concluded.
The French are anxious that 29-year-old Zinedane Zidane does not return before the tear has fully healed to avoid any possibility of aggravating the problem.
But the player, whose parents are Algerian, is now the subject of scrutiny across France, to the amusement of extreme-right leader and failed presidential candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen, who said the defeat by Senegal had not surprised him.
“This defeat did not surprise me. Today the French team is an ageing one and a tired one.
“I know that France today is clinging to Zizou’s thigh - but that’s the tough law of sport,” he said.—AFP
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