France: Deschamps, the lucky star of "Father Victory"

France: Deschamps, the lucky star of "Father Victory"
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AFP
/ Patrick HERTZOG, Franck FIFE

The first star as captain, the second as coach: Didier Deschamps sat even more his special place in the history of France by winning the 2018 edition of the World Cup, Sunday against Croatia (4-2) in the final

In the history of sport, the 49-year-old Frenchman sat at the table of the Brazilian Mario Zagallo and the German Franz Beckenbauer, the only two other figures of football that had previously won the supreme title as player and coach.

Nationally, on the night of the victory in the semi-final against Belgium Tuesday in St. Petersburg (1-0), he became the first coach of the French team to guide it to two consecutive finals of major tournaments, after that of Euro-2016 (lost 1-0 ap facing Portugal).

The two finals he had chained as player had been won: he was the captain l the golden age of the Blues, marked by the double World-1998 / Euro-2000, the first ever French World Cup title and the second European Championship, after that of the Platini generation in 1984.

"Dédé la Gagne"

Deschamps was then nicknamed "La Dèche", and had, ironically, completed the crossing of the blue desert, where he had known in particular the Bulgarian nightmare of 1993, raising the World Cup after a dream final (3-0 against Brazil's "Fenomeno" Ronaldo, Saint-Denis). And he had retired internationally on the European title in 2000.

The defensive midfielder had already entered the history of French football by being, in 1993, the captain of the first French team to win the Champions League, Marseille against AC Milan in the final (1-0). His proximity to the leaders, of public notoriety, had pushed some of his teammates to nickname him … "the eye of Moscow."

And it is in the Russian capital that he returned to the thread of his destiny, sewn with gold. Broken in the lost final of Euro-2016, which he kept resent two years later. "A final, it wins, yes, because the one we lost two years ago, we still have not digested," he said Tuesday night.

The Moscow final takes over story of "Dédé la Gagne". Because the result is his obsession, in a World Cup final as a card game. However, final question, the coach Deschamps presented before Sunday a list of four League Cups (with Monaco and Marseille) and last failed marches (Monegasque defeat in the Champions League in 2004 and blue in Euro-2016). 19659006] The "cat with DD"

The "chance to DD", or "chachatte with DD" in a language more familiar but now current, purrs again. Witnesses, a goal conceded by the Croats – first in the World Cup, then a penalty obtained thanks to video assistance to arbitration (VAR), again a first in the World Cup final.

During the tournament, this good star, he had not denied, but had added the notion of work: "That I am often in the right place at the right time, it is likely, I do not have to complain I know, and I obviously associate all of my staff, all the work that is done.There are requirements that are there, that's what I like. "

The course has not always been easy: Deschamps was close to the exit before the return barrage of the World Cup-2014 (3-0 win against Ukraine after a 2-0 defeat in Kiev) and probably would not have resisted an elimination in the 8th final against Argentina in Russia. "We have enough experience to know what could have happened" in case of elimination, admitted his deputy Guy Stephan, kingpin of the fluidity of relations in the group of Blues.

But here, the Ukraine and Argentina were two of his main feats, and bore his mark: at the foot of the wall, the team of France knows how to make the round back and win. Rebelote in 2018, at the end of a difficult first round in the game, and a semi-final passed to suffer

The Belgians had pointed this. "The frustration is there because we lose against a team that is not better than us, we lost against a team that plays nothing, defending," enraged goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois. "I prefer to lose with Belgium than to win with France," chained Hazard.

Deschamps' answer holds in a (good) star.

16/07/2018 00:07:03 –
St. Petersburg (AFP) –
© 2018 AFP