Back with the Blue after a week of isolation due to Covid-19, coach Corinne Deacon has never lost control of the tense daily life of the France team in recent days despite her absence, between supervision of sessions, choice strong workforce and regular media presence.
There have obviously been the usual tasks, at Clairefontaine, where training has been led by assistant coach Eric Blahic on the grounds of the Yvelines training center since Monday. But there were also strategic decisions and speeches, to which the boss of the France team was necessarily attentive, despite her positive test for Covid-19.
Without a new negative PCR test on Saturday, allowing him to find the group before the trip to Austria on Tuesday (9 p.m.), the entire rally would have taken place without the former coach of Clermont (L2). At the worst time for the 46-year-old technician, much criticized since her recent choice not to summon the captain, Amandine Henry, for “sporting criteria”.
“The instructions come from her”
In this context, having to remain confined to her home in Angoulême, far from a locker room already affected by the choice of goalkeeper Sarah Bouhaddi to put the selection on hold since September, must have worried the coach.
Without these controversies, the management of the group seems already very complicated, as she explained. “It’s a difficult situation,” she agreed in recent days, while insisting on the relationship of “trust” forged with her technical staff despite the very recent arrival (in January 2020) of Blahic in the framing of the Blue. But if he has somewhat “exceeded his duties” in the words of Deacon, the players have clearly detected that their “boss” was never far away throughout the week.
“She is still there in a way,” said striker Valérie Gauvin, referring to the cameras installed around the Clairefontaine grounds, allowing Deacon to supervise the sessions remotely. “We know very well that she is behind, that she is watching us. I think that the instructions come from her and are passed through the assistant or the rest of the staff,” confirms Elisa de Almeida.
Wendie Renard and Amel Majri on the bench
Corinne Deacon has indeed multiplied videoconferences with her players, and with her staff at the rate of “two to three times a day” according to Eric Blahic. “The supervision of training, team composition, strategy, game plan, everything remained in the hands of Corinne, which is logical”, develops the former assistant of Jocelyn Gourvennec in Bordeaux and Guingamp.
Against North Macedonia on Friday (11-0) in qualifying for the Euro, the surprising placing on the bench of Lyon executives Wendie Renard and Amel Majri, two players who had expressed their amazement after the announcement of the list, is a sign that does not deceive. “Eric (Blahic) gave the (pre-match) talk, but I think they agreed on the composition. I don’t have to comment on the choices,” explained current captain Eugenie Le Sommer, Deacon referring to her as “a choice of the moment”.
In recent days, the coach has even answered questions from the press in person, an exercise she does not particularly like. At the press conference before the game against North Macedonia, she vowed to “restore (his) point of view” after the criticism. There it is now back physically to Clairefontaine… Although, for many, she never really left.
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