{"id":490655,"date":"2025-10-11T09:37:14","date_gmt":"2025-10-11T09:37:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/490655\/"},"modified":"2025-10-11T09:37:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-11T09:37:14","slug":"what-frances-national-press-really-felt-about-arsenal-star-william-salibas-display-vs-azerbaijan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/490655\/","title":{"rendered":"What France’s national press really felt about Arsenal star William Saliba’s display vs Azerbaijan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Arsenal defender William Saliba started for France in their World Cup qualifier against Azerbaijan.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Les Bleus were the absolute favourites to win the game on Friday night, and they did not disappoint in front of their home fans at Parc des Princes.<\/p>\n

Kylian Mbappe<\/a> opened the scoring in first-half stoppage time, and goals from Adrien Rabiot<\/a> and Florian Thauvin sealed the game.<\/p>\n

Saliba helped his team keep a clean sheet at the back.<\/p>\n

William Saliba<\/a> had a comfortable evening against Azerbaijan. <\/p>\n

France absolutely dominated the visitors from the first minute until the last. They had 77 per cent possession of the ball and had 33 shots at goal compared to Azerbaijan\u2019s one.<\/p>\n

The attackers did a lot of work, but those at the back, like Saliba, were spectators for large parts of the game.<\/p>\n

The Arsenal star was given a 5\/10 rating by three media outlets \u2013 Foot Mercato<\/a>, 90min and GFFN<\/a> \u2013 not because he had a bad game, but because he had nothing to do.<\/p>\n

Foot Mercato wrote: \u201cOn his return in the blue jersey, the Arsenal central defender had almost nothing to do. <\/p>\n

Defensively, his duels were controlled, and he made four clearances on the opponent\u2019s meagre actions. We also saw him being clean in his raises.\u201d<\/p>\n

The French version of 90min<\/a> added: \u201cLess prominent than Upamecano, no more in demand. The Arsenal defender was making his return to France after missing the September training camp, and it was a very quiet evening for him. <\/p>\n

\u201cAn avoidable foul in the 15th minute in midfield, but nothing else to his credit. He\u2019s regained his rhythm and reflexes in the French national team.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"WilliamPhoto by Franco Arland\/Getty ImagesFrance manager Didier Deschamps has changed his mind on William Saliba<\/p>\n

Saliba was not always a guaranteed starter in the French national team.<\/p>\n

The Arsenal<\/a> star was behind Ibrahima Konate and Dayot Upamecano in the pecking order in the past, even when he was performing brilliantly for the Gunners.<\/p>\n

France boss Didier Deschamps even publicly claimed that he was reluctant to start Saliba<\/a> in the summer of 2024.<\/p>\n

That has completely changed now, as Saliba has consistently been preferred to Konate in the French side.<\/p>\n

If the 24-year-old is fit, he starts, and we expect that to remain the case in the 2026 FIFA World Cup.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arsenal defender William Saliba started for France in their World Cup qualifier against Azerbaijan. Les Bleus were the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":490656,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5309],"tags":[2000,299,36,10580],"class_list":{"0":"post-490655","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-france","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-france","11":"tag-william-saliba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115354865042355819","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=490655"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490655\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/490656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=490655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=490655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=490655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}