I don't know where is the old "les bleus" thread so i had to re-open one.


Players for the match Lithuania/France:

Goalkeepers :
Grégory Coupet (Lyon)
Mickaël Landreau (Paris SG)

Defenders :
Eric Abidal (Lyon)
François Clerc (Lyon)
Julien Escudé (FC Séville/ESP)
William Gallas (Arsenal/ENG)
Philippe Mexès (AS Rome/ITA)
Willy Sagnol (Bayern Munich/GER)
Sébastien Squillaci (Lyon)
Lilian Thuram (FC Barcelone/ESP)

Midfielders :
Abou Diaby (Arsenal/ENG)
Lassana Diarra (Chelsea/ENG)
Claude Makelele (Chelsea/ENG)
Rio Mavuba (Bordeaux)
Samir Nasri (Marseille)
Jérémy Toulalan (Lyon)

Strikers :
Karim Benzema (Lyon)
Djibril Cissé (Marseille)
Sidney Govou (Lyon)
Florent Malouda (Lyon)
Frédéric Piquionne (Monaco)
Sylvain Wiltord (Lyon)



L.Diarra, Nasri, Benzema and Diaby, he called the youngs !!
He called Piquionne too. And he said that he did'nt call Trezeguet because he was'nt ready mentally.

Nasri has been very good for us. But i hope that he will not have the big head now !

Domenech 's comments :

"The young players in the squad have to be ready to play,"
"I already have an idea about those who will start against Lithuania," the coach told a news conference. "It's a very important match, if not a crucial one."
"Everybody has to realise the World Cup is over and we're in a new phase," said Domenech, whose team's qualifying campaign has been marred by a 1-0 defeat by Scotland last October at Hampden Park.
"We can easily find ourselves in a situation more complicated than during qualifying for the World Cup," he added.

Good to see Nasri in there, how come no Trezeguet?

I'm suprised Gaël Clichy hasn't been included in the squad. He has been very impressive for Arsenal this season, but I guess his time will come. It's good to see Diaby get a call up though.

I've remembered that Clichy is injured at the moment, so that could be why he wasn't called up.

Diaby has been a beast for Arsenal on the occasions he has played this season as has Clichy, get well soon, Gael! Diaby is really beginning to look like a certain Mr Vieira!

Nasri has had a very good season for OM so far and it must be great for you, Hauru to see him in the squad?

Fred Piquionne had done well, too. All in all I'm very pleased with the squad that Domenech has picked......the future of French football! Allez!!

quote:

Originally posted by footballjunkie:
Diaby has been a beast for Arsenal on the occasions he has played this season as has Clichy, get well soon, Gael! Diaby is really beginning to look like a certain Mr Vieira!

I totally agree. I have been very impressed with Diaby this season, you wouldn't think that it has only been 10 weeks or so since he came back from that horrific ankle injury.

Clichy is also very exciting prospect, as long as he can stay injury free of course. All I can say is...Ashley who?

It's over, Lithuania/France :0-1. Ouf !
We were sooooo good.
Fortunately Anelka saved us.
Toulalan was very bad, he made a lot of faults.
L.Diarra and Diaby played their first match with Les bleus ! But Nasri didn't play.

Unfortunately, some lithuanians fans put a racist banner in the stadium.

I saw bits of the game and France were very poor. The coach has to be brave enough to put Nasri in the team, because the French lacked spark.

Yes, and it was a boring match. It's true that the pitch wasn't good and that we missed a lot of our key players (Henry, Ribéry and Vieira), but Domenech's tactic in this match was very bad. We played in 4-3-3, and we could see that it wasn't the best solution. Fortunately Anelka saved us. I hope that Domenech will put 2 strikers in the friendly against Austria !!
And we really missed Vieira, it's very different when he is not here .

Domenech will put the young players for the friendly match against Austria !!!

----------Coupet
Clerc, Mexès, Thuram, Escudé
-----Diarra, Mavuba, Diaby
----------Nasri
------Cissé, Anelka

France/Austria: 1-0, a goal of Benzema (and with Nasri's help )!
And Anelka is just WOW class

How did Diaby play in the game against Lithuania? I'm surprised that you said that Toulalan made a lot of mistakes, he's usually very solid is he not?

Sorry FJ, i had forgotten this post !

We won 2-0 against Ukraine saturday, with a goal of Ribéry (like the one of the match France/Spain in the WC), and another sublime goal of Anelka. It's a great victory because we missed Henry, Vieira and Sagnol.

We will play tomorrow against Georgia at Auxerres, i hope that they will take this match seriously.

France/Georgie: 1-0

But de Samir Nasriiiii !! (thanks to Ribéry of course)

1-0.
The second half has been very bad, we were tired and slow. Ribéry was the best player of the match. I just realize that i will no more see him with l'OM's shirt.
So we are first of the group B:

1.France 18 points
2.Italy 16 points
3.Scotland 15 points
4.Ukraine 12 points
5.Lithuanie 7 points
6.Georgie 6 points
7.Feroe island 0 points


Next match against our dear italians friends.

Domenech...

he is just pathetic.

That was in The Times today Hauru. 2 things, first it took him so long to question it. and second that ref has since reffed a French game without him saying anything, wierd.

I hope that i used the good word, when i said "pathetic". I wanted to say that it was stupid to talk about that. Domenech is a very bad loser, is very arrogant, and talks too much. I hope that the Uefa will blame it for his words.

No, no, it's fine, Hauru! You summed Mr Domenech up extremely well.

Friendly match today, Slovakia/France: 0-1 ( a quick free-kick of Henry)

We had a new defence, because Sagnol, Thuram and Gallas are all injured.

We played in 4-4-2:


----------Henry---Anelka
Malouda-------------------Ribéry
---------Makelele-Vieira
----Evra--Abidal--Mexès--Clerc
------------Landreau

Nasri wasn't titular because he is'nt enough fit, i hope he will be titular against Italy.
Our defence has been good.

That's not a bad 2nd defence, Hauru! Still better than Englands!

What do you mean by "titular"? I'm guessing that you mean fit?

Sorry, i translated directly from french !
In french, the word is "titulaire". For example, in this match, Henry and Anelka were "titulaires",they were in the team. Nasri was on the bench, so he was'nt include in the team.

Merci Hauru you should teach us more French.
How did the Henry-Anelka parternship work?

I post Henry's goal but it has been deleted.

The partnership Henry-Anelka works very well, and i think that they will play together for the match againt Italy. Anelka is too much class, it's great to have him back.

Domenech has 2 options:

-a normal 4-4-2 like in the match against Slovakia (with Henry-Anelka): we usually play like that since Zidane is gone.

-or a 4-2-3-1 with Nasri as a number 10.

Anelka has been getting better and better recently and he is running things for Bolton. Hauru, Anelka has been tending to drift out to the left for Bolton but Henry likes to do this, well he did for the Gunners, so how does this work for les bleus?