Sweden-France (0-1): for Olivier Giroud, “it’s a question of philosophy and desire”

The France team did not shine in Sweden, but it served to leave in the night of Stockholm with a short victory (0-1), at the opening of the League of Nations. Olivier Giroud, associated for the first time with Kylian Mbappé in a 3-5-2 system, is satisfied with the result but calls for more offensive involvement from his team, too little represented in the opposing area according to him.

You gave yourself few clear chances, especially in the first half. How do you explain it?

OLIVIER GIROUD. I touched my first ball at the end of the 11th or 12th minute… I explain it by the fact that the match was crescendo. There was a small round of observation. It is not easy to find your marks in this game system. There were new players to integrate. I had no doubts about our ability to be comfortable in this tactical set-up, but it took a little while. Everything was not perfect, it is a recovery match with very little training in the legs.

Are you frustrated with hitting so few balloons?

When we master this game system better and have more automation, we will be more comfortable. I hope that we will create more chances and that we will be more numerous in the box. It’s a question of philosophy, of envy. It is in the area that we score the goals and that we must be many. I didn’t have a lot of chances but still felt good for my first game.

Does Antoine Griezmann need to regain confidence, like his third consecutive missed penalty for the Blues?

Sometimes you shoot without looking and it goes to the bottom. And sometimes the cage seems a bit smaller. Everyone knows, we attackers, that certain times are more difficult, when you have to put your back, take refuge in work. I have known some. I’m not worried about him, he has the strength of character to score penalties again. I think he played quite a good game tonight, even if he didn’t score. Me, I did not have an extraordinary match, but I did not have a bad game either because I did not score.

Are you going to apply to take over on the penalties?

That’s none of your business, we’ll see internally. He will probably have to regain confidence by pulling them again at some point. I sometimes took over, but tonight I couldn’t shoot him (Editor’s note: he had just been replaced by Nzonzi).

What did you think of Adrien Rabiot’s return to the Blues?

It was an important match for him, he had been returning to the France team for some time. It was important for him to gain confidence at the start of the match. He too rose crescendo as the match progressed. He was very good at the recovery, he played very soberly. With N’Golo, they were in the oven and in the mill in an environment where the two players must have a lot of volume, slide. He made his comeback. We know his potential and we know that he can bring even more, but everyone will congratulate him on his match.

Why the 3-5-2 was more difficult to implement than against Albania and how are you with Kylian Mbappé?

Without denigrating Albania, we must take into account the opposition. We lost against Sweden in 2017. We knew it wouldn’t be easy against this team which has mastered this 4-4-2 perfectly. Spain saved the draw at the last minute. We knew we wouldn’t give this team 4 or 5 goals. If we could, we would have done it, but we hadn’t played together for 10 months. We do our utmost in training to improve our automatisms. With Kylian and Antoine, we complement each other, we talk to each other a lot to find solutions. Kylian has done us good with an individual achievement. This system may suit him.