In a turn nobody expected; the best and most dangerous player at Euro 2024 left the field of play against Austria looking like Steve Bruce. Consequently, France now face the prospect of shaking up their system or falling short due to a lack of Plan B...
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00:00Hello everyone, Adam Monk here from 442 joined by Adam Cleary, a rare unification of the
00:10presenters in a top secret location, which is a, well that's the studio where we've been
00:16filming the videos in the background over there, and here's a little makeshift one to
00:20discuss none other than France who played last night and beat Austria 1-0, would you
00:26say it was in convincing fashion? No, no, no I would not, France obviously like probably
00:33like the logical favourite to the tournament, I know obviously England have had the shortest
00:36odds because of the players available, but France I think a lot of people thought that's
00:40going to be the team that ends up getting there, they were similar to England in that
00:44they were really good, they started strong, there was lots of good patterns of play and
00:47then as the game wore on they looked less and less sort of comfortable, Austria got
00:52into it, Austria started finding ways, started finding means, started finding opportunities
00:55and yeah kind of fell away a bit, and obviously they should have scored, Mbappé had that
01:00fantastic chance at the end, but I think if you're Austrian right now you're probably
01:04wondering how you didn't get something out of the end of that, yeah especially with that
01:08Baumgartner chance, which is a great name by the way, Baumgartner, yeah but he probably
01:13should have put Austria 1-0 up and then Mbappé forced that own goal like two minutes later
01:17and speaking about Kylian Mbappé, it's on the screen there, well he's apparently out
01:22for the Netherlands game now, apparently he doesn't need surgery, I can't believe he
01:28doesn't need surgery because he came out like, this is not my joke but he did come off that
01:32pitch looking like Steve Bruce, which is like, that's the last thing you need, like the slow
01:37motion version of it which you can see his nose just go completely from left to right
01:41across his face, I don't know how that isn't like major major bone damage, have you googled
01:46like how bad a nose break like that actually is, I'm not a doctor but it's very very apparent,
01:51it's six to eight weeks recovery time if you do something like that and it's like no sport,
01:56no activity, nothing intense for like at least six weeks to two months, so the fact he's allegedly
02:00apparently come out of this hospital in Germany and they've gone, oh no it's fine,
02:05I don't understand that at all, dare I say it, it smacks a bit of Ronaldo at the 2002 World Cup
02:10where it's a bit of a cover-up where like he was injured but they just made him play through it,
02:15I think it could be one of them where like he's out for the next game but then he just turns up
02:18like Batman for the third game of the group stage, it's not a hamstring strain is it,
02:23the guy's nose is on the left hand side of his face, it's not just like you can play that down
02:27and say oh it's fine, yeah he just popped it, it was actually altitude, that's why it was bleeding,
02:31nothing, it was nothing really serious but France, from what we know he's not going to play against
02:37the Netherlands, he's going to be touch and go for, is Poland the end of the group, yeah he's
02:42going to be touch and go for the Poland game, obviously it's not too disastrous if that's the
02:46case because of the group format as it is now, they've got their one win, that'll probably see
02:50them through in some capacity but if it's longer than that, which you know at the minute we don't
02:55know if it is a serious break and they've just got that wrong, you will miss a fairly big chunk
02:59of the tournament, France without Mbappe is not, well a good and b was certainly not the plan
03:06because I think we'll go through the game in a minute and look at all this other stuff,
03:11we've lost a signal on that, that's a good start, that certainly was not the plan for them going
03:15into this and France are about as set up for one player as it is sort of possible to be,
03:22I mean in the groups, sorry not the groups, in qualifying they were quite different to this,
03:27they were playing him directly off the left, Giroud was playing most of the games, he was sort
03:31of like a very important cog in that system but they've come into the tournament and they've just
03:36gone, well our best chance of winning this is just by letting Mbappe do whatever he wants, so that's
03:40the starting 11 as it was sort of released and as it sort of panned out and they've got him at
03:44centre forward there with Griezmann behind, Turam on the left but that wasn't how that game panned
03:50out at all, like if we've got some, what have we got next? So we've got the heat maps, that is
03:56Mbappe's heat map in the game, so predominantly on the left hand side there but he forced the goal
04:01from the right with the own goal which would show really that dare I say he kind of had a free roll
04:05almost like a Jude Bellingham, like he could just sort of drift to whatever side of the pitch he
04:09wanted, Griezmann wasn't necessarily leading the line either and neither was Marcus Turam so you
04:14could actually say they didn't play with a striker did they? Not a recognised one anyway like Giroud
04:20No I think that's part of the idea with this system as you can see there like that's Mbappe,
04:25he's not playing as a centre forward at all like he's drifting out on the left to get on the ball
04:28and then what he wants to do is drive from that left hand space towards goal which I think is
04:32pretty much where that second chance came from, obviously it's a big counter-attack in Switzerland
04:36wide open but he does sort of get it in that left hand space, drives towards the goal and the
04:40selection around him specifically like Turam, Rabiot and Griezmann is sort of designed to like
04:47you let him go wherever he wants to go, you let him do what he wants to do, if he wants to go out
04:51to the left then you know Griezmann sort of steps into the centre forward position, he's not
04:56going to track back which is sort of not his job at all so that's why Turam's there because he'll
05:00work forward and backwards, the whole team is set up around allowing Kylian Mbappe to do
05:06Kylian Mbappe things which is fine but when you lose Kylian Mbappe it's kind of you've got to
05:12have a massive massive rethink. Yeah absolutely I'll just say as well that I think that dot on
05:16the heat map the main focal area is where he just laid down for five minutes before he forced
05:22himself off the pitch so I think we can ignore that part but yeah just looking at the other
05:25heat maps I'll flick through them here like we've got Anton Griezmann's of course like dotted all
05:29around the park, he's you know yeah Jack of all trades, Rabiot quite similar in that respect as
05:34well and then you've got you know Marcus Turam kind of on both flanks really I suppose as well
05:41like you know I think I think the Turam and the Rabiot thing's quite interesting for those sort
05:44of like those big splodges on the left hand side because obviously Mbappe is playing on that side
05:50more than anything else and yet have you got you got Teo Hernandez is there that's that's what I
05:54was really looking forward to that is a man who knows the player playing in front of him is not
05:58going to be doing anything coming back the other way like Teo Hernandez is so so good with the ball
06:04and yet that just stops dead on the halfway line doesn't it like he knows he can't really push up
06:11too much because of that gap it's going to leave and obviously Turam's there to sort of cover across
06:14and sort of like make sure they don't get completely completely exposed Rabiot's like
06:19I like Rabiot but he sort of got this reputation I think in France of being such a boring pick
06:23given the options they've got available but again perhaps England could be learning something from
06:28this if you want to play a particular player and get the best out of them that maybe means you have
06:32to sacrifice a few other talented players to make that work and that's why Rabiot's there that's why
06:36Hernandez is behaving like that that's why Turam's coming on both sides that's why Griezmann's dotting
06:41out across the entire pitch when it just looks like he's just supposed to be in behind Mbappe so
06:46we have sort of labored this point somewhat but it really is important to understand that
06:50this France side is literally just about getting everything you possibly can extract from killing
06:56Mbappe which is fair absolutely I mean he's the best player in the world one more thing I was
07:01going to say we do we have kind of scripted this we knew what we were going to talk about but in
07:04terms of in terms of N'Golo Kante though like we've actually we actually didn't really discuss
07:09him him coming back into the frame after seemingly like two years absent from top level football and
07:14just seemingly having more stamina last night than he's ever really displayed in the last five years
07:18does that help facilitate what France wants to do when they do have Mbappe because of how good he is
07:23out of the out of possession well I think as you know literally every point here is just that this
07:28helps them get the most out of their best player like the Kante counter-attack where he sort of
07:34wasn't the full backs who covered over it wasn't the center backs who burst back in it was this
07:38player for whom you know allegedly there's question marks over what he's been doing the last two years
07:42you know what what's the level like in Saudi Arabia has he finished is he this is that thing
07:46you just saw there that like he his time in European football absolutely was not up when
07:51he decided to end it and it probably still isn't even up now yeah I mean the thing is as well like
07:57you probably get some people being a bit sniffy and being like well it was only Switzerland but
08:00like Switzerland are a good side with Austria sorry Austria a good side with a lot of energy
08:06and to put in a performance like that and bail them out at like that one moment as well like
08:12that's absolutely huge but again I don't think necessarily when you're looking at that French
08:17midfield and the options available to you you go and pick and go Lokante from the obscurity
08:22of Saudi Arabian football unless you're trying to do something specific with one player like Mbappé
08:28so again that's big like actually it's paying off for them already but we have to talk about
08:35what they're gonna do without him and then yeah looking at France without Mbappé the last two
08:40times that they played without Kylian Mbappé well the first time was a 2-1 loss to Germany
08:44which was an international friendly but you can see here he's in a 4-4-2 shape with Colo Moane
08:51sort of leading the line with Antoine Griezmann so is that something you could see them
08:55going towards it also says Adrien Rabiot is on the left hand side of midfield there as well
08:59yeah I think like the what that what that's posted as and what the reality is probably quite
09:03different I think France is only they've only really got two options when you think about this
09:06right they can either keep doing exactly what they're doing and giving someone else the Mbappé
09:11freedom on that side Kingsley Coman for example just bring somebody else in and go look
09:15we're set up in this way we think it's gonna work just go and do Mbappé for us do you do
09:20your best approximation of what that is or they kind of go back to the system they had in qualifying
09:24which I think you bring you bring Giroud in you'd stick him up front and then you just sort of like
09:29again you'd have somebody do the Mbappé role that's that's what it is actually that's the
09:33game against Greece yeah with Colo Moane and then Colo Moane seems to be the one who is Mbappé
09:40sort of you know second in command yeah like the thing is I that's obviously the sensible
09:45thing to do like obviously Olivier Giroud you're talking about class being permanent within
09:49like you've got it in abundance there the obvious thing to do then is to just you bring Colo Moane
09:55and you do this exact same thing but given that the rest of the side is so set up almost to its
09:59detriment to be about Mbappé like there's no there's no Camavinga there for example there's
10:05no Tshimeni like there's way more spectacular and you know there's way more sort of aggressive
10:10and more front foot midfielders France could be playing but they're not because of the sort of
10:15the downside to playing Mbappé which is you don't expect him to work back the way you don't expect
10:19him to cover over you've got to sort of like mitigate for that lack of stability by picking
10:24your Cantes by picking your Rabiots now if you're the French manager and you're bringing someone else
10:30in just to fill in for what Mbappé was doing but they will work back like they will do those things
10:35you know they're not gonna be as good going forward but they're also gonna be a lot better
10:37going backwards do you not then start to think well should I maybe loosen things up in the middle as
10:42well because I would that that translates to club football now because Mbappé's gone to Real Madrid
10:47who are his midfielders Tshimeni and Camavinga so maybe and Modric and Valverde you know yeah
10:54the controllers are there but you know Tshimeni will play every game so maybe you know France
10:58will take a leaf out of that future book but we shall see and then yeah finally I mean obviously
11:03the Mbappé omission is going to be a crisis or a little bit of one if it is against the Netherlands
11:08you know like William Saliba he made his first international tournament start for France
11:13yesterday after an amazing season for Arsenal in replacement of Ibrahima Kanate who's of course at
11:21Liverpool so you know what what's in the dynamic is there you know is there anything to read into
11:25Saliba starting the games as opposed to Kanate does he bring something different to France
11:30well he's just I mean I don't think it's controversial to say he's had a better season
11:34I don't think it's controversial to say he's probably a better player as well it's just that
11:37like with most international teams when you've got a settled sort of defense
11:41you're very sort of reluctant to unsettle it so I mean you'd have to ask Deschamps why he's done
11:46that but obviously I don't think bringing Saliba is too much of a problem the issue France have
11:50got is like obviously everybody talks about how all these international sides tend to win
11:54tournaments on basically the strength of their defense and how settled that is and obviously
11:58they've already made a bit of an issue they've already made a change here they didn't look
12:02massively comfortable at the back certainly like again when you compare it to the England game it
12:06was sort of similar in sort of you know they took a lead and then they had to defend but I don't
12:10think England looked under anywhere near as much sort of pressure of losing that game as France
12:15did they weren't letting Serbia in behind whereas that kept happening to France quite a lot I would
12:22sort of argue that without Mbappe I don't think France necessarily have got the defensive stability
12:29to go and win this tournament like clean sheets for them in the build-up and in qualifying have
12:34been not impossible to come by but they've not exactly been in yeah if you're in between obviously
12:41the German game which we looked at before they conceded twice there they conceded against Scotland
12:45which you know certainly in that run they were on was was quite the rare sight they should have
12:50conceded in their opening game as well I I would worry for them without that sort of fire you know
12:55I'd say it's just like a generalized point I think yes Mbappe you could argue is the best player in
13:00I think France's strength in depth is slightly overstated outside of the world of Kylian Mbappe
13:06I do I think what I mean by that is if they lost Mbappe that's the biggest detriment to their team
13:11as opposed to like as opposed so my point is let's say let's say England lost Kane right it'd be it'd
13:17be a terrible blow right but England could then theoretically adapt to that with the likes of
13:23maybe Jude Bellingham in a false nine or something like that or they've got quality behind in each
13:28attacking area they've got an abundance of quality in each position I'm not I'm sure I think
13:32France's drop-off is bigger is what I'm trying to say that if they lost Mbappe and because they're
13:36so centered around optimizing him it ruins them effectively I'd also say Germany arguably have
13:43better depth in that regard yeah I you know what actually you've won me round onto that although
13:47I would say the analogy you'd use was if England lost Jude Bellingham that kind of feels a little
13:51bit more like it's built on sand I think France have a very very good squad they've got I I
13:58stand by that England have got the best 11 at this tournament France probably got the best
14:02squads and maybe even Portugal have got sort of the best beyond that yeah the best the best depth
14:08I would say though that they have clearly built this around Mbappe we've literally gone through
14:13like this entire selection for this France team is built so much around getting the most out of
14:19what they clearly believe is the best player at this tournament and if you take that away from
14:25them I don't think it even really matters what the drop-off is whoever you bring in however close
14:29they might be at that level which of course is a distance away it's gonna the unsettling that's
14:34gonna have through the rest of the team not even not got that bloke who can just do it by himself
14:39yeah psychologically you don't know which way that's gonna fall because I'm sure some managers
14:43would tell you that's the best thing that can happen because then everyone's gonna step up
14:46and they've got to do it etc but also at the same time I play on a football team when our one player
14:52who was good isn't there we assume we're going to lose and you know what happens we do lose we
14:56lose even some of your saves yeah we lose even when he's there drop a couple in the edit probably
15:01no that's not that's actually in the later day we lose even when he is there to be fair so that's
15:04sort of by the by I I would I don't think France know what they'll do necessarily well certainly
15:11tactically I do know what they'll do they'll bring in they'll bring in Griezmann they'll go back to
15:14what they were doing qualifying but I don't think they know what they'll do in terms of how far
15:18they'll go and what they'll be capable of without Mbappe inside now we should say this this is a
15:23very dramatic way of saying like he's probably going to miss the Netherlands game might miss
15:27Poland but there is just this there's still an inkling for me and there's still a little bit of
15:33talk that this actually might be being played down to an extent and they're sort of hoping
15:38yeah I I think it could be potentially cut I mean certainly the talk I mean so you saw
15:43De Jong's in the post-match press conference the vibe the vibe was like this is the end of the
15:47world this is the worst thing that could have possibly happened um but we'll see back to the
15:522014 World Cup Neymar had a back injury and Brazil capitulated yeah I'm getting similar vibes I'm
15:58getting similar vibes and one more point I'd make on France it's not necessarily tactical
16:03Dio Upamecano in my opinion out of defenders at top level clubs is maybe maybe the worst
16:11I've seen in your yeah Mark's nodding I don't know why he starts ahead of Canate
16:17is there a tactical reason you're aware of because every time I've watched him he's he's awful
16:24every time I have watched him he's had an absolute disaster class
16:28however I don't think I've watched him enough for that to be a completely fair representation
16:32of his ability I assume there must just be things I don't see but I will acknowledge that I have not
16:39seen them yeah Upamecanic that's what we call them look I think if you've got Cante in there
16:46specifically on that side as well that does sort of mitigate that but and you've got Koundé as well
16:49who's the center half I guess as well I just my my gut feeling for France is that they could be
16:56on one of these journeys that these sort of these fancied nations go on when they're relying so much
17:02on a player who's not quite fully fit I think you've you've turned me on to the idea here that
17:08we're seeing the next Ronaldo or Neymar limping through a tournament in real time and I think the
17:13way yeah and I think simply put the way that France set up yesterday exemplifies that yeah
17:18well I guess the question that remains all the question that we're asking is just whether France
17:22have a plan b and yeah basically in a nutshell in a and they're playing a decent side in the
17:28Netherlands too so we shall see but regardless that was the end of the first installment of
17:34whatever this is discussion on the euros a game on a sofa and you can check out the latest edition
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