France beats England and offers a very Morocco’n roll semi-final – Liberation

The Blues qualified for the semi-finals by barely getting rid of the Three Lions (2-1) thanks to goals from Tchouaméni and Giroud. They will return to Morocco next Wednesday.

There was a mysterious scent over the last quarter-final of the Qatari World Cup scheduled for the Al Bayt stadium in Al-Khor, the first three qualifiers – the Argentinian, Croatian and Moroccan selections – having made it clear to those present that everything that had happened so far, from the collective tendencies to the individualities through the way of conducting the matches, was no longer worth anything. We switched to something else, the truth of the moment, a gesture, very little things. Time has shrunk.

And the Blues narrowly won the match (2-1), propelling themselves to a semi-final against a Moroccan selection that they will not take higher than the Premier League superstars they dominated on Saturday, because that’s not their style – ever. They might as well have lost. They weren’t superior in any way, but not inferior either. The penalty sent by Kane in the clouds ten minutes from time sealed this match. The Tottenham striker never lacks it, however.

huge firecracker

The meeting started slowly, the mutual mistrust shattering everything that could resemble, from near or far, a momentum. A few English spades on the tricolor right defender Jules Koundé, targeted as a weak point, two or three runs from Kylian Mbappé to remind the English of their defensive duties and the game was sailing nicely. And there, a big boom! Huge firecracker of about twenty meters from Aurélien Tchouaméni, yet less likely than a lot of others to tip the match in front, and the Blues took control (1-0, 17th).

Harry Kane and others then raised the tone. A favorable VAR shot (25th), a trigger from Blues goalkeeper Hugo Lloris on a mine from Kane (28th), a radiating corner behind (29th): at the half-hour mark, in the spirit, they came back at a breath. But the Blues put their foot back on the ball. Ousmane Dembélé and Antoine Griezmann took out the toolbox, unscrewing (yellow card for both players) each opposing counterattack. Dayot Upamecano took the Kane file in hand, delivering an incessant duel to the Tottenham striker who, for once, no longer found a dark corner.

The coach, Didier Deschamps, took his part by harassing the fourth referee. In short, the Tricolores did it by experience, with much self-sacrifice, Mbappé looking at the affair with an often amused eye. 1-0 with lemons and the English rags, frustrated, aware of playing a match which is not (anymore) good. They had the merit of insisting. Lloris has already cleared a shot from Jude Bellingham under the bar (47th) when Tchouaméni, still him, hangs Bukayo Saka in the box: Kane puts his up on penalty (1-1, 53rd) and he then comes to no one the idea of ​​crying foul. It was then, in the middle of the second half, that the truth dawned on us: these two were almost equal.

Knives drawn

The English were perhaps a bit more dynamic, the Blues more inhabited or devious but here we are, the same players (we are talking about level), the same intensity, the same collective investment … Olivier Giroud went to pick up a cross from Griezmann to put the Blues back in front (78th), Kane shot over a second penalty which seemed very generous to us even if Théo Hernandez should have mastered his charge on the English striker and we will still keep the deformed faces of Giroud and Raphaël Varane in front of the French supporters after the first goal, an expression of rage that has no chance of coming out anywhere other than during a World Cup meeting at loggerheads.

On the peno, Mbappé screamed his joy and we saw a parable there: perfectly taken by the English defense, he will have crossed the meeting as a witness. So far, his teammates have been watching him do it. All in all, the France team is advancing. She is two games away from reclaiming her 2018 title.