“It’s a new competition that begins.” This sentence, the French team made it its mantra, before meeting Belgium, Monday 1is July at 6 p.m., in what constitutes the toughest line-up in the round of 16 of Euro 2024. Didier Deschamps, William Saliba, Ibrahima Konaté, Eduardo Camavinga: in turn, those who have spoken in recent days repeated it, clinging to it like a lifeline, at the end of a disappointing first round (only one victory and two goals scored – one against their side and a penalty – in three matches), which raised doubts about the ability of the French to go far in this competition.
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This refrain comes from a firmly anchored conviction within the Blues: the truth of the beginnings of the competition is not that of the direct elimination phases. “The impressions of the first round are not those of the second round”wants to believe the coach, who obviously remembers the 2018 World Cup. France had laboriously extracted itself from the first round before transforming itself during the round of 16 against Argentina (4-3), then displaying impressive collective mastery. A less pleasant memory for Deschamps, Portugal in 2016, European champion (1-0 against France in the final), had lined up three draws in the group stage.
The history of major international tournaments is full of teams who reach their peak too early, and others who reveal themselves when the time for decisive matches arrives, at the moment when collective expression has had time to mature and states of individual shapes to homogenize. At the moment, too, where other qualities come into play, such as experience in the final stages or the ability to maintain a result.
“Another dimension”
Deschamps, who as coach has won eleven out of fifteen knockout matches in major tournaments, is one of those who considers that a month-long competition is long enough for a team to evolve. “On Thursday, the coach brought us all togethersays Ibrahima Konaté. He spoke to us, I had the feeling that we were entering another dimension. You no longer have to think or do calculations. There, there is only one option, it is to win to move on to the next round. » “He told us that we had to focus on the future, that the past was in the past.”complete Eduardo Camavinga.
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The question now is whether this change of approach, the French experience (20 out of 25 players have already played in the final phase of a major tournament) and the five days without playing since the last match against Poland can be enough to correct the limits that appeared in the game. With a solid defensive base but a great lack of offensive inspiration, and supposedly decisive players (Ousmane Dembélé, Antoine Griezmann, Kylian Mbappé) far below the expected performance, and lacking in complicity.
The French luck may be to cross Belgium. A team which also did not maintain its seeded status and finished in second place in its group (behind Romania), with a mixed record (one victory, one draw and one defeat), no richer than that of the French offensively (two goals scored).
The Belgians even had a falling out with their fans, who whistled at them after a third match considered timid (0-0 against Ukraine), provoking the anger of captain Kevin De Bruyne, who asked his partners not to go to greet the public once the match is over, and the incomprehension of coach Domenico Tedesco, who said ” surprised “ by the reaction of the supporters while his team was qualified. But this kind of climate can cement a group, and this is rather what the Belgian press perceives, without being totally reassured about the potential of its selection.
Belgians dream of erasing 2018
This one is in transition, but the squad remains very solid. The talented passer Kevin De Bruyne and the serial scorer Romelu Lukaku – who has been denied three goals since the start of the Euro – are the two leaders of a quartet of thirty-somethings who survived the 2016 and 2021 Euros (elimination in the quarter-finals in both cases) and the 2018 World Cup (defeat in the semi-finals against France).
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With Thomas Meunier, Jan Vertonghen and Axel Witsel, this old guard of the Belgian golden generation still hopes to win a trophy, in a team largely rejuvenated by players playing in the English Premier League – Timothy Castagne (Fulham), Jérémy Doku ( Manchester City), Wout Faes (Leicester), Amadou Onana (Everton) or Youri Tielemans (Aston Villa) – and whose goalkeeper, Koen Casteels (Wolfsburg, leaving for Saudi Arabia), made a good start to the tournament ( only one goal conceded). With the passing trajectories that De Bruyne knows how to find, the art of dribbling of Doku and the speed of Lukaku, the team is profiled for the counter-attack, which could lead France to be cautious.
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Belgium, obviously, dreams of erasing the traumatic defeat at the 2018 World Cup, experienced as an injustice. Since this Russian evening – in which five Belgians and five French people from the current squad participated – the former “friends match” has become a poster that oozes rivalry, like this video published by the Belgian Amadou Onana, then withdrawn, in which it was a question of “tackle Mbappé on the shin”. “It’s going to be a complicated match because they’re going to want to take their revenge”warns Ibrahima Konaté. And then Belgium, too, is probably telling itself that a new competition has begun.
