THE BLEUS PRINT
Didier Deschamps believes in destiny. He always has done, ever since he was a player hoovering up trophies, and then as a manager doing the same. He believes history can repeat itself, and that dates and occasions hold a special significance. For someone who’s regarded as pragmatic, that might come as a shock. But countless footballers are superstitious and Deschamps, now 52 years old, is certainly no different.
Things haven’t always worked out quite so conveniently. At Euro 2016 on home soil, there was a belief that France would win because they had always done so as hosts – in 1984, when Michel Platini inspired Les Bleus to Euros glory with one of the greatest ever individual tournament displays, then again at the 1998 World Cup. Instead, the team failed at the final hurdle in miserable circumstances against Portugal five years ago – but when destiny knocked again in 2018, Deschamps & Co unlocked the door.
Twenty years earlier, Zinedine Zidane had united a nation divided by social tensions in defeating the mighty Brazil of Rivaldo and Ronaldo with a brace in the final, giving Deschamps the honour of hoisting aloft the World Cup trophy as skipper. Two decades on, he joined the exclusive club of winners as both a player and manager, after Mario Zagallo (1958, 1962 and 1970) and Franz Beckenbauer (1974 and 1990).
In Russia, Deschamps guided Les Bleus all the way to the title with the kind of defensive doggedness that he once epitomised as a player, burnished by the emergence of Kylian Mbappe – more explosive than Thierry Henry’s in 1998, but not dissimilar either.
From 1998 to 2018: it was destiny.
THE TROPHY CARRIER
In 2021, Deschamps has his eyes firmly fixed on European Championship joy. Thankfully for a man who loves symmetry and
