By News writing
Published on 14 Oct 20 at 9:32
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Not very exciting Sunday, October 11 against Portugal (0-0), theFrench team challenge her Croatia in front of several thousand supporters in Zagreb, Wednesday 14 October in the League of Nations (8:45 p.m.), hoping for an awakening from the playing master Antoine Griezmann and his attack.
If there were not “many sparks” at the Stade de France, there will in any case be an atmosphere at the Maksimir stadium in the Croatian capital, where they are expected 7,000 fervent supporters from the team to the checkerboard. “A little hostility” which “will do good” to the Blues, according to their captain Hugo Lloris.
“Home fans bring a lot,” Croatian coach Zlatko Dalić commented at a press conference on Tuesday. “We have already felt it with the last match against Sweden (2-1 Sunday, note) where they came despite the rain,” he added with reference to the somewhat dilapidated enclosure in the east in Zagreb, whose initial capacity (35,000 places) has been reduced since an earthquake in March.
Modric back
The confrontation between the French world champions and their opponents in the final of the 2018 Mondial will be all the more flavorful as it will be replayed with the 2018 Ballon d’Or Luka Modric who, by drying up the September rally, had missed out on his on the way to Saint-Denis (French victory 4-2).
“The Croatia team is much stronger when he’s there,” Didier Deschamps said on Tuesday. “He was not Ballon d’Or for nothing, and if Croatia made it to the World Cup final, they owe it a lot”.
The French coach is also hoping for a more lively match than the one concluded without a goal on Sunday against the solid Portuguese defense. IHe will have to rekindle the flame of his attack, extinguished against Portugal in the wake of Antoine Griezmann, offensive leader unable to combine correctly with Kylian Mbappé.
Griezmann in diesel mode
The FC Barcelona striker, little flourished in Catalonia since his arrival in 2019, is however not the type to remain on a failure with the Blues, and this did not escape Deschamps, who took care to recall before the press statistics of “Grizou” in Blue, namely 32 goals and 21 assists. “It speaks”, hammered “DD”.
“I see a player ready to defend, to make efforts for his teammates, on that we can not question him”, also developed Lloris, calling on his partners to “help” in these times “a little more complicated ”.
In November 2019, Griezmann lit up the trip to Albania (2-0 victory) with a decisive free kick and then his 30e goal in selection, a few days after a duller performance by his partners and himself against Moldova (2-1 victory). More recently, in September, the 29-year-old did not really shine in Sweden (victory 1-0), before raising his level against Croatia.
Deschamps will need the diesel Griezmann to shift into high gear in front of these same opponents.
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Which starting eleven?
In Zagreb, the coach could be tempted to renew part of the team that challenged Cristiano Ronaldo on Sunday at the Stade de France, even if the players of Bayern Munich have a game to play from Thursday in club, and those of PSG from Friday . Because for him, it is not “the balance” which sinned, nor the quality of the aligned players, but rather the animation of the game. And the opposition provided by Portugal was, to hear it, a good one. part of the problem.
“I am expanding our range so that I can change at any time, during a match or from one match to another. We must be able to keep a system that has been our strength, but also to bring variety, ”he explained Tuesday.
Source AFP
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