France v Brazil friendly

[Raees]

Neymar is a sensational talent and what was great about today's performance was that you could tell his game has gone up a level through his time at Barcelona.

His movement off the ball to find space was fantastic today, the french defenders were all at sea trying to second guess where he was going to move into and once he got the ball there was a maturity to his game which is getting better all the time.

He can be better than Cristiano for me - he has the talent to combine Ronaldo's explosiveness with the silks of your great brazillian playmakers.. his passing and ability to link up play/orchestrate proceedings is superior to the Portuguese.

Messi is something else though. . Neymar will have to up his game by several levels if he wants to attain that level of play.

Neymar has to prove he can be a key player in a champions league victory though before he can merit being compared to either of them.

 

[ivaldo]

Its hard to beleive Brazil beat France with just Neymar playing.

 

[Sassy Colin]

Freaks me out how much Gustavo looks like Nani.

What, because they both wear number 17?

 

[Snake Plissken]

People might think I'm harsh on his international record, but it's just not as impressive as some people imply, not to me anyway.

Having said that, he's a ridiculously talented player and he's definitely destined to be a ballon d'or winner and the next 'star' of world football. As for getting to Messi's level, I mean it's not impossible but I still doubt it, when Messi was Neymar's age he'd already won the Ballon D'r twice and was having what for me was probably the most impressive individual season I've seen in 2011 when they ended it by winning at Wembley.

 

[Drifter]

Say what you like about Dunga he's certainly making them hard to beat.

 

[Paul the Wolf]

Hilarious thread, goes from France are going to win the next World Cup , sign up all their players, to France what an awful team, how fickle can you get
No they're not that good and other than Pogba wouldn't really want any of them

 

[The Stain]

Hilarious thread, goes from France are going to win the next World Cup , sign up all their players, to France what an awful team, how fickle can you get
No they're not that good and other than Pogba wouldn't really want any of them

Read through it again, i'm on your side. With all the talent you have, i can see France being contender for a few EC's/WC's to come. If the players can just stay away from being banned by the french FA for visiting brothels, etc. Btw, why didn't Blanc succeed? I like his tactics at PSG.

 

[Paul the Wolf]

Read through it again, i'm on your side. With all the talent you have, i can see France being contender for a few EC's/WC's to come. If the players can just stay away from being banned by the french FA for visiting brothels, etc. Btw, why didn't Blanc succeed? I like his tactics at PSG.

I live in France but I'm English by birth, they have some very good players like Pogba, Lloris but think a lot are over-rated on here. They could do well in the Euros especially at home. If some of the younger players improve they could do reasonably well in the next World-Cup but would not rate them higher than any of the other "big" European nations.
Interesting last night after the match when as the French way they interview lots of the players and the manager and they don't rate themselves so highly and know they have a lot of improvement to do.
An example for me is Varane, scored a goal but defensively scares me much more than Jones, positioning etc, struggles to get in the RM side and he may improve as he matures but if he came now to the PL, eek.

 

[Annahnomoss]

Read through it again, i'm on your side. With all the talent you have, i can see France being contender for a few EC's/WC's to come. If the players can just stay away from being banned by the french FA for visiting brothels, etc. Btw, why didn't Blanc succeed? I like his tactics at PSG.

He's interesting, he has a really strong character - capable of making the toughest decisions possibly like benching Cavani or playing him out wide because it is better for the team. Or "Blanc's first move as manager was to suspend all 23 players from the 2010 World Cup Squad from his first game, as collective punishment for a number of negative incidents involving the squad, which had occurred during the course of the competition. He also reversed the policy on providing only halal meat at team lunches."

But at the same time he's been getting critique by his players for being too nice and not being hard enough on them and so forth.

He's okay tactically, but in a good way. He rarely makes any mistakes because he has too many stars in the team and tries to get them all in the first eleven like we've seen under Moyes or LVG.

But at the same time he's pretty damn basic and hardly ever makes any spectacular tactical innovations or changes. He plays a very dominant 4-3-3 with two ball playing central defenders(for PSG) and racks up great possession statistics but the team is not at all bothered if they have to play on the defense in a game.


"On 8 June 2007, Blanc was named the new manager of Bordeaux, replacing Brazilian Ricardo. For his first season on the bench, he led the club to a second place in the league and won the Manager of the Year award. His second season was extremely successful, as Bordeaux won the final 11 games of the season, setting a new French record for consecutive wins,[13] and clinched the league title, three points clear of Marseille, having already won the Coupe de la Ligue that year. Blanc was again nominated for Manager of the Year but lost to Marseille manager Eric Gerets.

In the 2009-10 UEFA Champions League, Blanc's Bordeaux topped a group featuring Juventus and Bayern Munichwithout losing a match.[14] After defeating Olympiacos in the Round of 16, they were eliminated by compatriots Lyon in the quarter-finals."

 

[Rooney in Paris]

If anything, players like Matuidi and Varane are widely underrated, except on the back of a European game in which they will shine. Matuidi notably has been consistently very good for 2 seasons, he's not the most elegant of players and his technique isn't top notch, but he's a very functional midfielder who's excellent when used correctly. Benzema is also an awesome #9. Varane, for me, is the most talented young CB, but of course he might not develop as I expect him to.

Their defence, especially fullbacks, are nothing special though.

 

[The Stain]

If everything clicks this looks pretty interesting, no?

------------------------ Lloris -------------------------
Corchia ----- Varane ---------- Laporte -------- Digne
--------------------- Schneiderlin ---------------------
-------------- Pogba ------------- Matuidi -------------
-- Griezmann ---------------------------- Lacazette --
---------------------- Benzema ------------------------

Lacazette utilized on the left. Fekir, Zouma, Kurzawa, Kondogbia, Martial, Thauvin, Grenier, Sanson, etc, knocking on the door.

@Annahnomoss

Yeah, he possibly needs to toughen up a little. Tactically he seems to get the balance of his teams right most of the time (i watch pretty much all PSG games because i need to soak up all that is Zlatan before he retires, i'm swedish). The fact he's capable of making tough decisions is a big plus.

 

[kouroux]

Sagna and Evra should never be called up again, they're so past it.