Absenteeism will not go through him. Unless you miss a step going down to have breakfast on Tuesday, September 7, Antoine Griezmann will play, against Finland at the Groupama Stadium in Décines (Rhône), his 55e straight away match with the France team. A record.
Didier Deschamps can no longer do without his striker with 39 goals in 97 caps, but in recent months the coach has also given the impression of not knowing how to use it.
Unintentional goalscorer (from the back) against Bosnia and Herzegovina (1-1) in the first of three matches of this qualifying session for the 2022 World Cup, September’s Griezmann looks like that of the last Euro. Willful, disciplined but losing influence in the game.
The smile is still there, but it hides a background of sadness. Whether he is “exiled” to the right or replaced in support of the center-forward – his favorite position – as against Ukraine on Saturday September 4 (1-1) in the absence of Kylian Mbappé and Karim Benzema, the thirty-something makes copies at best tasteless and is scattered in defensive tasks.
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Sense of sacrifice
This sense of sacrifice is not new. The native of Mâcon could have been a child of Montevideo as he claims a taste for this combat football and sweat under the influence of the players of the Celestial met at Real Sociedad then at Atlético Madrid. “I do not give up, I give everything, like them who make the effort for the teammates”, he shouted before finding, and beating, his Uruguayan friends in the quarterfinals of the last World Cup (2-0).
More Edinson Cavani than Lionel Messi in his (non-) management of efforts, Antoine Griezmann returned a statistics sheet of defensive midfielder in Kiev with the highest number of tackles for a Blue (six), the second total of duels won ( seven) or balls collected in the middle (three).
When the France team was enthroned on the roof of the world in 2018, “Grizou” was a star in the service of the team. Almost an oxymoron in modern football where the career plans of each other sometimes pass above the collective.
Putting on the warming blue does not offer an immunity totem. If Didier Deschamps publicly spares his favorite number 7, we have seen him reframe it several times against Bosnia, urging him to occupy the right lane.
But in Strabourg as in Munich, Budapest or Bucharest during the Euro, Griezmann was attracted by the axis like a butterfly by the light. “Like Kylian [Mbappé], I know very well that the closer it is to the goal, the better ”, admits the coach.
Orphan of Giroud
Because he started from the principle that the great players necessarily speak the same language, Didier Deschamps may have underestimated the consequences of Karim Benzema’s return.
With its attacking trio, France had to bring Europe in line and buy a style of play. In fact, the Benzema-Mbappé-Griezmman trident sometimes looks like a three-way household in which the last one occupies the role of the lover in the closet, so much the first two display their complicity on and off the field.
Olivier Giroud is no longer even in the apartment. With the defector from AC Milan (absent from the last list), Griezmann had found his perfect complement, a classic and physical center-forward around which he was free to gravitate as with Diego Costa during his happy years at Atlético Madrid. (2014-2019).
It was before saying yes to FC Barcelona. A thwarted and failed marriage. In Catalonia, the Frenchman was eclipsed by the star Messi. So he tried to adapt, to make himself useful, to the point of sometimes forgetting himself.
On the revival at Atlético
From a technical and attack leader with the Blues and the Colchoneros, he has become a very expensive complementary player at 120 million euros transfer. With the Blues, he left the penalties to Benzema and even some free kicks to Mbappé, not yet known as an expert in the field however.
Unhappy at Barça, less fulfilled in the selection, Griezmann felt the need to change. This summer, he confided his desire to return to Atlético to some of his former teammates. The post was explicit enough that the club secured their loan one minute before the transfer market ended. In Madrid, he will find Diego Simeone on Wednesday, his requirement but also his unconditional love.
For the person concerned, no one understands his game better than the Argentinian coach. This return to the recent Spanish champions should allow him to become again the player he was – in club – before his departure for Barcelona, a generous but decisive striker too. A star in the service of the collective and not drowned in it in a way.