Thursday\u2019s game against Brazil was used to fine-tune France\u2019s current best XI<\/a>, Didier Deschamps made no mystery of his intentions to use tonight\u2019s encounter against Colombia to flex Les Bleus depth, and thus offering some of the players who are not yet certain to board the plane the chance to step up.<\/p>\nAdvertisement<\/p>\n
Deschamps will have some headaches to solve, and hearts to break, given the remarkable collective and individual performances he saw at Landover\u2019s Northwest Stadium. Warren Za\u00efre-Emery, Maghnes Akliouche and Marcus Thuram have all seized their chances whereas Maxence Lacroix has certainly more than filled William Saliba\u2019s absence. Meanwhile, Pierre Kalulu and Randal Kolo Muani may not have done enough to change Deschamps\u2019 mind in the absences of Jules Kound\u00e9 and Bradley Barcola.<\/p>\n
Rayan Cherki proving invaluable<\/p>\n
The Manchester City attacking midfielder was unsurprisingly given the nod to fill in for Michael Olise in France\u2019s No. 10 role. The Lyon Academy graduate was an absolute joy to watch, linking up play with ease. Cherki also succeeded at evading Colombia\u2019s press with his pace and his hypnotic touches.<\/p>\n
Involved in both D\u00e9sir\u00e9 Dou\u00e9 goals, Cherki was logically singled out by Colombian players who more often than not fouled him. One of them even struck him in the face. That\u2019s how insufferable Cherki is for opponents, and how invaluable he became for France, despite being part of the squad for less than a year.<\/p>\n
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The old breed steps up<\/p>\n
On his 35th birthday, N\u2019Golo Kant\u00e9 was tasked to anchor France\u2019s midfield alongside PSG\u2019s Warren Za\u00efre-Emery. The Fenerbah\u00e7e midfielder midfielder delivered a trademark dominant display, recovering an almighty amount of balls and setting up the press pace. The fact he is considered a squad option speaks volumes about France\u2019s ridiculous depth.<\/p>\n
Speaking of squad options in the second half of their career, PSG\u2019s Lucas Hernandez deserves a shout-out. Despite limited game time with Luis Enrique\u2019s Les Parisiens, the older of the Hernandez brothers offers freshness, physicality, versatility and experience in spades. After missing out on the 2022 World Cup in tearing his ACL for France\u2019s opening game against Australia, Lucas Hernandez will surely have the opportunity to double his World champions medals come summer.<\/p>\n
GFFN | Bastien Cheval<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"France\u2019s B team made little work of Colombia\u2019s A team courtesy of Marcus Thuram and a brace from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":217,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[274,214,69,199,5,225,268,17,273,21,218,272,271,226,270,269,210],"class_list":{"0":"post-216","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-france","8":"tag-bastien","9":"tag-bradley-barcola","10":"tag-colombia","11":"tag-didier-deschamps","12":"tag-france","13":"tag-les-bleus","14":"tag-lucas-hernandez","15":"tag-maghnes-akliouche","16":"tag-manchester-city","17":"tag-marcus-thuram","18":"tag-maxence-lacroix","19":"tag-michael-olise","20":"tag-pierre-kalulu","21":"tag-psg","22":"tag-randal-kolo-muani","23":"tag-rayan-cherki","24":"tag-william-saliba"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}