French National Day: 100 reasons why we love French football
1) Bixente Lizarazu slapped Lothar Matthäus.
Oh, what times those were when FC Bayern was FC Hollywood! When the little Basque slapped Loddar during training in 1999, many a FCB star felt more than just secret satisfaction. Which led Harald Schmidt to this point: "In the video, you hear clapping, and you don't know: was it the slap or Effenberg's applause?"
2) Corinne Diacre coached a men's second division team.
This had never happened before: a woman showing male professionals how it's done. However, Corinne Diacre's engagement at Clermont Foot was much more than a fleeting media coup. From 2014 to 2017, she worked at the provincial club and got everything she could out of it. Today, she coaches the women's national team.
3) French players do not play cards in their free time, but play boules.
4) FC Nantes has the brightest jerseys.
Green and yellow – the club from the port city of Nantes is so famous for these rather unusual club colors that its players are nicknamed the "canaries." The poultry won the league title eight times in their brightly colored jerseys, and in 1996, FC Nantes even reached the semifinals of the Champions League.
5) Footix was the last good World Cup mascot.
Lions without pants? Computer-animated fantasy creatures? Not with the French. Their mascot was simple and classic – and its name referred to indomitable Gauls.
6) “Allez les Bleus!” is the most melodious battle cry.
7) The Ballon d'Or is the most famous award.
No FIFA award can compete with the prize that the magazine “France Football” has been awarding to the best player of the year since 1956.
8) Mickaël Landreau was exceptionally helpful to the team.
The goalkeeper played more Ligue 1 matches than anyone else. Landreau made 618 appearances for Nantes, PSG, Lille, and Bastia, but earned only eleven caps in his long career. He traveled to five major tournaments without playing a single minute. Yet, never a word of anger escaped his lips; he was always the perfect number two.
9) Eric Cantona gave a press conference that consisted of just one legendary sentence.
In January 1995, Eric Cantona lost his temper. When the Manchester United star was racially abused by a spectator during a match against Crystal Palace, he jumped over the barrier and kicked the fan in the chest. This "kung fu kick" even threatened with a prison sentence. The case was heard in London on March 30. Cantona was lucky; he only received 120 hours of community service. After the verdict, the Frenchman faced the press waiting for a statement. Cantona looked into the cameras and still cameras. Then he said slowly: "The seagulls follow the fishing boats because they think sardines are being thrown into the sea." And with that, he left.
10) One of the coolest tricks is the “Marseille Turn”.
He didn't invent it, but because no one painted the move, also called "roulette," on the pitch as beautifully as Zidane, the stepping onto the ball followed by a spin is called the "roulette" in English after Zidane's hometown.
11) The always beautiful jerseys of the Équipe Tricolore.
12) Guy Roux was the eternal coach.
When he became player-coach at Auxerre in 1961 at the age of 23, the club was a debt-ridden fourth-division team. Thanks largely to his excellent youth development, Roux led the team to the top of the national team over the next four decades. By the time he retired in 2005, Roux had won one league title and four cups.
13) The 1961 Cup winners, Union Athlétique Sedan-Torcy, merged five years later with RC Paris – a club based 250 kilometers away.
14) The Stade Furiani in Bastia is a cauldron.
The stadium in the Corsican city only holds around 17,000 people, but that's precisely why it's so loud. A few years ago, PSG goalkeeper Salvatore Sirigu described the noise made by the fans as "harmful to health."
15) Without Gabriel Hanot there would be no European Cup.
In December 1954, Gabriel Hanot, editor of the French sports newspaper L'Équipe, traveled from Paris to England to watch the eagerly awaited Hungarian wonder team Honved Budapest take on Wolverhampton Wanderers. Under floodlights, the home team won a brilliant 3-2 victory, prompting the Daily Mail to proclaim the Wanderers "Champions of the World." This went too far for Hanot. He published an article headlined: "No, Wolverhampton are not yet World Champions of Clubs!" The subheading read: "But L'Équipe proposes a European Championship for clubs." Less than nine months later, the first match in the new European Cup took place.
16) No one is as proud of his schoolboy humor as Franck Ribéry.
Toothpaste under the doorknob? Salt in the coffee of the person sitting next to you? Water showers from the roof? Even the most banal joke amuses Ribéry royally – and that makes him wonderfully old-fashioned.
17) Zinédine Zidane's elegance was wonderfully casual.
The greatest art of all: making the difficult look easy. What Zinédine Zidane had practiced thousands of times on the concrete of his childhood, he later demonstrated in the great halls of football. The crazy thing: Although Zidane's game sometimes seemed like a slow-motion replay, his opponents almost always came up short. His handling of the ball seemed almost sleepy—but only because he had perfect control of it.
18) Henri Michel not only looked like Alain Delon, but was also the better Michel Platini.
19) Just Fontaine had the best nose for goals at the World Cup.
Nothing against Gerd Müller, but Fontaine's record is of a different caliber: 30 goals in 21 games for France, 13 of them at the 1958 World Cup alone. A record to this day, or rather, forever!
20) The Marseillaise is the best national anthem.
21) The unusual training methods of the national team in 1973
22) Franz Beckenbauer played his last international match at the Parc des Princes.
How fitting that the Kaiser retired from the international stage at the Parc des Princes. On February 23, 1977, he led the German national team onto the pitch as captain for the last time – France won 1-0.
23) Everyone wanted to wear the socks like Marius Trésor.
Nobody played as casually with his socks rolled down as the central defender from Guadeloupe, whose look at the 1978 World Cup inspired a generation of street footballers (and probably Hans-Peter Briegel).
24) In the five-year ranking, France always lands well behind Germany.
The French Ligue 1 is naturally one of Europe's five major leagues—but it is also traditionally the smallest of the five. This is important for Germany because only the associations in the top four of the UEFA rankings are allowed to directly enter four representatives for the Champions League group stage. Despite the millions of dollars from Qatar, there is currently no danger that this situation will change any time soon.
25) The picturesque backdrop of the stadium of AS Monaco, the club from the tax haven.
26) In Brittany there is a Gallic football village: Guingamp.
If the map at the front of the Asterix books is to scale, then the municipality of Guingamp lies just 60 kilometers west of the spot where the village of the indomitable Gauls stood in Caesar's time. Not inappropriate, because although Guingamp has fewer than 7,000 inhabitants, the local football club has somehow managed to stay in the top league for five years. And not only that: The men from Armorica have reached the French Cup final three times and even won the trophy twice, in 2009 and 2014. When you also know that stars like Didier Drogba, Florent Malouda, and World Cup winner Stéphane Guivarc'h once played for EA Guingamp, there's only one thing left to say: By Teutates!
27) The Platini, Tigana and Giresse axis shaped an era.
It's actually absurd that this midfield, brimming with genius and esprit, ultimately only won the 1984 European Championship. The fact that this was thanks to players like Wolfgang Dremmler, Ditmar Jakobs, and Norbert Eder makes things even a little crazier.
28) "But", by far the most beautiful word for goal.
29) Fashion designer Daniel Hechter designed a jersey for PSG in the 1970s.
30) Johan Micoud is now a winemaker.
Running a stationery store after his career? A toto collection point? Not with a Frenchman! True to style, the great Micoud now produces a Merlot called Château La Connivence.
31) Europe's first black star played for Marseille.
The Moroccan Larbi Benbarek moved from Casablanca to Olympique Marseille in 1938, led the team to the runner-up spot and was called up to the French national team.
32) Jean-Jacques Annaud made a very famous football film.
“That’s the end of it for me” (originally: Coup de tête ) was released in 1979 and is a biting satire on the glamorous world of football.
33) The venerable “L'Équipe” still appears daily.
The newspaper has officially existed since 1946, but its origins can be traced back to a magazine called "L'Auto," which was by no means exclusively dedicated to motorsport (in 1903, "L'Auto" created the Tour de France to increase circulation).
34) Dominique Rocheteau was a football hippie.
He was one of the most distinguished charismatics in French football history, which was not short of charismatics. Even more than Platini, this dark-haired dribbler was a pop star, with his peculiar running style and mischievous smile. Almost every boy in Saint-Étienne wanted to be like him.
35) PSG legend Luis Fernández, who once had himself photographed half-naked in bed after breakfast.
36) Arsène Wenger invented beautiful football.
In recent years, when everyone at Arsenal was just longing for his departure, something has been forgotten about how much this noble man from Alsace contributed to the aesthetic component of the game.
37) The French cup competition is the craziest in the world.
Imagine a small amateur club being drawn against a professional team in a cup – and then having to travel halfway around the world to even get to the match venue. Well, that's quite normal in France, because in the seventh round of the Coupe de France de Football, eleven clubs from the French overseas territories suddenly join the clubs from the mainland that have made it this far. We're talking teams based in exotic locations like Martinique or Polynesia. The travel record was set in 1976 by Nickel Nouméa from New Caledonia. The team flew 16,756 kilometers to play against third-division club AS Corbeil. And after a resounding 3-0 defeat, they traveled the same distance back.
38) RC Lens fans are crazy.
During non-coronavirus times, almost 30,000 spectators flock to every home game at the Stade Bollaert-Delelis – even in the second division. Lens, the team from the traditional mining region in the north, is something like the French Schalke. Being a fan of this club isn't a superficial pastime, but a way of life.
39) No name reads as beautifully as that of Claude Makélélé.
40) Robert Wurtz was the “Nijinsky of the whistle.”
Just one example: When players and coaches threatened to escalate a match between PSG and AJ Auxerre in 1989, referee Wurtz ran to the sideline, knelt before visiting coach Guy Roux, and folded his hands in prayer. Such theatrics at the referee's beck and call are no longer seen today.
41) The logo of Le Coq Sportif.
42) Kylian Mbappé is fast. Very fast. Very, very fast.
To be precise: The 24-year-old PSG star is so damn fast that he scored four goals in just 13 minutes in the league match against Lyon on October 8, 2018.
43) Albert Camus said: “Everything I know about morals and obligations I owe to football.”
44) The Stade Vélodrome in Marseille is a stunner.
With a capacity of 67,394, France's largest club stadium has it all: a long history (it was built for the 1938 World Cup), passionate fans, and a picturesque location on the Mediterranean. The dream home of French football.
45) Ousmane Dembélé's curler against Bayern Munich was named Goal of the Month in April 2017.
Yes, it's true: BVB fans resent the young man for saying goodbye to Dortmund in French. But they – and many other German football fans – will always hold him in their hearts for this sensational goal. One hook, one glance, one curler into the far corner, and Bayern were eliminated from the cup in their own stadium.
46) The FC Metz coat of arms features a dragon and a Cross of Lorraine.
47) Raymond Kopa was known as the “Napoléon of football”.
One could take the easy way out and attribute Kopa's nickname to his height of just 1.68 meters, but that would hardly be a fraction of the truth. As part of the "White Ballet," he won the European Cup three times with Real Madrid in the 1950s, and France's third-place finish at the 1958 World Cup would have been unimaginable without the brilliant passer.
48) The green of AS Saint-Étienne
49) Didier Deschamps won the World Cup as a player and coach.
And only two other people can say that. First, Mário Zagallo, who triumphed on the pitch in 1958 and 1962, and on the sidelines in 1970. And second, of course, Franz Beckenbauer (1974, 1990).
50) Montpellier became sensational champions in 2012.
First a relegation battle, then, quite unexpectedly, the first championship in the club's history: What Leicester City achieved in England in 2016, Montpellier had already accomplished four years earlier. Incidentally, they also did so against pimped-up competition: PSG finished second back then.
51) In the 1930s, Oskar Rohr was able to do in Strasbourg what he was not allowed to do at home: play as a professional.
When FC Bayern Munich won its first German championship in 1932 against Eintracht Frankfurt, one of the decisive players in the final was 20-year-old Oskar Rohr. Because the Nazis seized power soon after, Bayern's Jewish coach Richard Dombi left the country – and Rohr followed him. The reason was probably that the young man wanted to make money from football, which was forbidden in Germany. Rohr became top scorer in France in 1937 and led Strasbourg to the cup final. But then German troops marched in – and Rohr ended up as a traitor, first in prison, then in a concentration camp, and then on the Eastern Front. Fortunately, he survived it all and returned to his hometown of Mannheim after the war.
52) Jean-Paul Sartre knew: “In football, everything is complicated by the presence of the opposing team.”
53) Thierry Henry was the first to pull his socks up above his knee.
54) Albert Batteux built one of the great teams – Stade Reims.
In April 2018, the traditionalists rejoiced when Reims returned to the top flight. In the 1950s, thanks to legendary coach Batteux, the small club was a flagship of French football and reached two European Cup finals.
55) National player Joel Bats was a poet.
When he became seriously ill in 1982, the then 25-year-old goalkeeper began writing poems for therapeutic purposes. He later set some of them to music and sang them.
56) Surprise champions, the second: OSC Lille.
57) Because of a heraldic symbol in its coat of arms, Girondins Bordeaux is also called “the club with the chevron”.
58) Emmanuel Petit inspired one of the best chants of all time.
None other than future Gunners coach Arsène Wenger nurtured the whirlwind Petit from the Monaco youth system to the first team. And when Wenger moved to Arsenal in 1996, he quickly brought Petit to London. At Highbury Stadium, where Arsenal still played at the time, the fans chanted: "He's blond, he's quick, his name's a porno flick – Emmanuel, Emmanuel!"
59) David Ginola cultivated his eccentricity.
Just one example of how he was different from others: his role in the war film "The Last Mission." Ginola's fluctuations between genius and madness weren't well-received by everyone; former coach Gerard Houllier simply called him a "scumbag."
60) The players of Nîmes Olympique are called les Crocodiles.
61) No one zipped down the flank as beautifully as Didier Six in Stuttgart.
Unfortunately, the Frenchman, who was popular with VfB fans, was only allowed to swarm through opposing defenses for two years before coach Benthaus dropped him.
62) In 2006, (almost) no one could get past the back four of Sagnol-Thuram-Gallas-Abidal.
France played seven matches in the "summer fairytale" and conceded only three goals – until the final in Berlin came down to a penalty shootout. The team deserved the title, something they then had to wait another twelve years for.
63) The kisses on Fabien Barthez's bald head are unforgettable.
64) Lilian Thuram is committed to fighting racism.
Paying lip service to racism is common practice among footballers, but few embody this commitment more credibly than the Équipe Tricolore's record-breaking international player. Thuram is a member of the French Integration Council, has made films and exhibited on the topic—and clashed with then-Interior Minister Sarkozy when he incited hatred against the banlieues.
65) Many stadiums used to have a cycling track.
What German stadiums have in their running tracks, French velodromes have in their stadiums—although this is hardly surprising in the land of the Tour de France. The Stade Vélodrome is the most famous example, but two-wheelers also raced around the oval in Bordeaux, Reims, Valenciennes, and the Parc des Princes in Paris.
66) At Stade Rennes you can find the Galette-saucisse, a stadium sausage in a crepe.
The high priests of the German bratwurst are probably having a crisis, but it actually looks pretty funny when half the stadium shoves these things down their throats. And it even tastes good, at least a little bit.
67) French youth training is the best in the world.
The DFB is dreaming of what the French established at Clairefontaine in the late 1980s with their planned academy. A national performance center where the country's best footballers will be developed in a modern way, without regard for regional vanity. The results were evident at the 2018 World Cup: No one else in world football boasts such a cornucopia of talent.
68) The SC Bastia jerseys from 1978 were iconic.
69) The comedian Gérald Dahan fooled Raymond Domenech and Zinédine Zidane.
In the fall of 2005, French President Jacques Chirac was hospitalized for a week due to a mild stroke. Voice impersonator Gérald Dahan took advantage of this situation. On the morning of the World Cup qualifier against Ireland, he called the French team hotel in Dublin, pretending to be Chirac, and asked to speak with national coach Raymond Domenech and captain Zinédine Zidane. "You would do me great pleasure if you could place your hand on your heart during the Marseillaise," Dahan asked them both in a faint voice. That evening, the nation was promptly astonished to see all the players place their right hands on their chests during the national anthem. When Domenech learned he had been duped, he said: "It was a great moment, and I don't regret it."
70) Fourth division club Calais RUFC reached the cup final.
And then they almost won in May 2000! Only a penalty goal in the 90th minute defeated the amateurs, who had eliminated two first division and two second division teams on their way to the final against Nantes.
71) The annual showcase of future superstars takes place in Toulon.
The best football club from Toulon, a port city east of Marseille, has never won a title and is currently playing in the amateur league. Nevertheless, the town's name has a strong reputation in the world of football. Since 1974, a tournament for U21 national teams has been held here every year. It was once considered an unofficial World Cup and still carries enormous prestige. This is evident from the list of young stars who have been named "Player of the Tournament," which includes names like David Ginola (1987), Alan Shearer (1991), Rui Costa (1992), Thierry Henry (1997), Javier Mascherano (2003), and James Rodriguez (2011).
72) Lucien Laurent scored the first goal in World Cup history.
"I had no idea at the time about the significance of the goal," Laurent said in a 1998 interview about his volley 68 years earlier. "We didn't even know if the idea of a World Cup would really take off."
73) Every virtual manager was after Henri Saivet.
In 2008, the striker, who was then playing for the French U18 national team, was considered a superstar – in the "Football Manager" simulation, where he was considered the next Thierry Henry, almost on the same level as Messi or Ronaldo. Today, Saivet plays for Newcastle United.
74) The anti-fascist Red Star Paris is the second oldest club in the country.
The English Guardian called Red Star the "oldest, hippest, and most political club in Paris." Although the current third-division club's successes (five cup wins) date back decades, for its fans, it's the perfect antipode to the slick PSG.
75) No one turned up his collar as coolly as Eric Cantona.
76) The unofficial nickname of the national team is “Black-Blanc-Beur” (Black, White, North African).
77) Christophe Dugarry wore a headband with style.
The "Lex Piplica" states that no one can wear a thin leather headband without looking foolish. Dugarry was the only exception.
78) Robert Guérin was co-founder and first President of FIFA.
Given the developments of the past decades, one might well argue whether FIFA was such a good idea. From the perspective of journalist Robert Guérin, however, there was no doubt about it. In 1904, however, the focus was not on mere money, but on the excitement of international matches.
79) The Adidas Tricolore is the most beautiful ball of all time.
80) His colleagues called Laurent Blanc “le président”.
Zizou was the maestro of the 1998 World Cup-winning team, and Laurent Blanc was the man who held things together at the back. And when things weren't going well up front, he pitched in there too – like with his golden goal that decided the round of 16 match against Paraguay.
81) The first World Cup trophy was named after Jules Rimet.
It's hard to believe, but there was a time when FIFA presidents weren't villains, but impeccable people. Men of honor like the lawyer and practicing Catholic Jules Rimet, who came from a tiny village called Theuley. Rimet held the longest tenure of any president of the world governing body (1921 to 1954) and was considered the driving force behind the introduction of the World Cup, which is why the original World Cup trophy bore his name, which in turn inspired Liverpool's Lightning Seeds to famously utter "Jules Rimet still gleaming." Rimet's last official act, incidentally, was to present the Coupe Jules Rimet to a certain Fritz Walter in the pouring rain in Bern.
82) Djibril Cissé was and is extravagant.
In the end, he often stood out more for his hairstyles, and it's easy to forget that Cissé was a truly good footballer. Not only because he won the Champions League with Liverpool FC in 2005.
83) Bordeaux was the epitome of hospitality.
Away trips in the European Cup are not always subject to entertainment tax, but Eintracht fans will still be telling their grandchildren about the trip to Bordeaux in the year of our Lord 2013 – and that has a lot to do with the calmness of the southern French, who turned the visit of 12,000 Frankfurt fans into a celebration.
84) Because of a city in the South of France, German hobby troops are called “Nothing Toulouse” or “Born Toulouse”.
85) All films with Eric Cantona are good.
Well, maybe not all of them, but most of them. And anyway: Eric Cantona as Eric Cantona in the Ken Loach film "Looking for Eric" – that's... yeah, that's great cinema.
86) Bixente Lizarazu has a surf camp on the Atlantic.
The man has a family history of surfing; his brother Peyo is one of the best surfers in the world. But Bixente can also ride waves like the devil – and anyone who wants to can learn from him.
87) The shirt that Michel Platini never tucked in.
88) Robert Pires and Thierry Henry tried the most daring penalty trick.
One lays off, the other shoots: Arsenal's French team planned this trick in a 2005 match against Man City. The punchline? It backfired.
89) Bruno Metsu had the most beautiful corkscrew curls.
The coach, born in the far north of France, was a special man even beyond his hair. After several stints in lower leagues, he ventured out into the world, becoming popular as coach of Senegal, with whom he reached the quarterfinals of the 2002 World Cup. A special bond: Metsu later converted to Islam and was buried in Senegal after his death in 2013.
90) 1. FC Saarbrücken was the best team in the French second division in 1948/49.
After the war, Saarland enjoyed almost ten years of independence. Between 1948 and 1951, it even had its own football league, the Ehrenliga. However, the state's best club, 1. FC Saarbrücken, was too good for the competition, so only its second team competed. Meanwhile, the first team, known as FC Sarrebruck, played out of competition in the French Division 2. The Saarlanders would have been promoted if they had been allowed to. In June 1949, FCS applied for admission to the French football association, but their application was rejected.
91) Nicolas Anelka was smuggled to Madrid airport in the trunk of a car.
Many considered him an arrogant jerk, but this stunt was classy: After the falling out with Real Madrid, Anelka fled in the trunk of his car, leaving the waiting journalists in a daze.
92) Aimé Jacquet had the best gray hair.
The 1998 World Cup coach always seemed like he'd just come from the Sorbonne, where he'd given a lecture on the late works of Simone de Beauvoir. And us? We had Vogts.
94) No one crossed from the half-field as beautifully as Willy Sagnol.
In the ancestral gallery of French guest workers at FC Bayern (Papin, Lizarazu, Ribéry), he seems a bit brittle. But they could always use someone like the industrious, perennial flanker. And Carsten Jancker is waiting up front.
95) The way Franz Beckenbauer said “Jean-Pierre Papin” will never be forgotten.
96) Nowhere can you celebrate more stylishly than at the Arc de Triomphe.
97) Lilian Laslandes got the best nickname.
Laslandes almost scored a brilliant overhead kick against Dortmund. However, it was for Auxerre, not for 1. FC Köln, where he was loaned in 2002 and where fans dubbed him "Laslandesliga."
98) Dimitri Payet scored perhaps the best goal in a European Championship opening match in 2016.
Your team is playing in a tournament on home soil. Expectations are huge. Everyone expects a win against Romania in the first game, but with the final whistle, the score is only 1-1. You hammer the ball into the top corner from 18 meters. It's a game you can play.
99) Josip Skoblar scored 44 goals for Marseille in one season.
Croatian Skoblar is no stranger to Germany either – he played for Hannover for several years and was briefly a coach at HSV. His greatest year, however, was in Marseille. The 44 goals he scored in 1970/71 remain a French record to this day.
100) As early as 1996, a woman was employed as a linesman in Ligue 1.
Nelly Viennot, who officiated at around 200 top-flight matches, was also the only woman in the shortlist when the referees for the 2006 World Cup were selected.
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