French Football Failing in Europe

Phillip Buckley

French football is rapidly tumbling down the European ladder. For the second successive season there is not a single French side in the quarter finals of either the Champions League or the UEFA Cup. How can this possibly be the case when French players and players developed in France are some of the finest in the world? The French league is not a European pauper and its attendances at Ligue 1 level are reasonably healthy. Yet once again French fans are left not knowing who to cheer in the latter stages of European competition.

You could argue that French football has never been particularly prolific at European level anyway. Only one team has ever lifted the Champions League (or European Cup under its previous guise) and that was a discredited Marseille side in 1993. The UEFA Cup, amazingly, has never been won by a side from France. In the now defunct Cup Winners Cup, France has, as with the Champions League, one win to its name through Paris Saint Germain in 1996, when they saw off the not-so-mighty Rapid Vienna in Brussels.

Before the 2006/07 season things had been healthy, by French standards as Lyon reached the Champions League quarter final (where they had always seemed to stumble.) In the UEFA Cup three teams had progressed to the Round of 16 (Marseille, Strasbourg and Lille), and although another three progressed to the same stage last season, now things have tailed off badly.

Move forward to today and we see France’s last European participants, Marseille in the UEFA Cup, exiting to Russian side Zenit St Petersburg, once again meaning no French team in the quarter finals of either European competititon. Many in the French establishment though don’t see the lack of their clubs in the latter stages as a large problem. Gerard Houllier commented “I don’t think that Marseille were worse than Zenit.” Yet this head in the sand approach does French football no favours.

When we think of French football we inevitably think of Lyon. It’s hard not to. They have won the last 6 successive Ligue 1 titles and in many cases without breaking a sweat. Furthermore they’ve supplied a stream of top talent to other European clubs over this period. Names that spring to mind include Michael Essien, Mahmadou Diarra, Florent Malouda Edmilson and Eric Abidal. All these players moved on to wealthier leagues and bigger clubs.  

Yet what is the telling point in this is that many of the players Lyon have sold on came from other French clubs. Lyon act as a hoover, drawing up some of the best talent in the French league, keeping it for a few years and then selling it on for a large profit. Michael Essien arrived at the French Champions from Corsican side Bastia, Abidal from Lille and Malouda from Guingamp. Looking at only Lyon is by no means accurate, but we can draw the conclusion that the talent is out there. France has not stopped producing players of massive potential overnight, in fact, it has not stopped at all.

French clubs are still exporting talent, and not just top talent at that. For every Thierry Henry and Florent Malouda that leaves Gallic shores there is equally a Benjani and a Ousmane Dabo. Neither Benjani nor Dabo are likely to set the world alight or tread the turf of the Nou Camp for Barcelona, but what they could do is make a telling contribution to the French league. John Utaka is another who springs to mind, swapping Rennes for Portsmouth, most probably soley in the pursuit of greater riches.

What this illustrates is that the French league is not just being robbed of its stars, as we would expect given that Ligue 1 is no La Liga, but it is also being robbed of its everyday professionals. Former France and Liverpool coach Gerard Houllier agrees believing that French players should feel more responsibility to their league rather than jumping abroad at the first chance, “leaving Ligue 1 shouldn’t just be a question of money. You must be professional in your approach to leaving”. Houllier though himself mopped up talent from France that was never top draw in his time at Anfield, bringing in average players such as Bruno Cheyrou, Carl Medjani and Gregory Vignal. All now back with French clubs having failed abroad.

Youth is an area which offers French clubs some hope. In the Under-21 squad (from the last match with Wales) only 4 out of 19 played their football away from France. Yet with idols from the senior team by and large gracing the Premier League, La Liga or Serie A, we can judge what path these youngsters will choose to tread given half the chance.

Another problem that seems to carry over into European competition is the lack of goals generally found in French football. France is well known amongst football bettors as a graveyard for the over 2.5 goals bet and those willing to take this on in the notorious Ligue 2 can often be found in an asylum the next day. Indeed it’s a strange phenomenon that French football should be regarded as one where fewer goals are to be found. What is the reason for this?

Some French clubs are guilty of persisting with a formation last seen when the French won the World Cup on home soil in 1998. Coach Aime Jacquet triumphed with one up front for most of the tournament and French coaches drew the conclusion that this was a system that worked.

Another reason could perhaps be the continual rise and rise of the athletic player. Ligue 1 has many players from France’s former African colonies and these tend to be big, strong and able to run all week long. Former France maestro Christophe Duggary claimed that “most managers have become so negative that they don’t want to even recruit creative players, preferring big, athletic guys who can run 100 yards in 11 seconds but don’t have the imagination to pick out a pass”.

Maybe though, a failing of French football is that this is what is often needed, or believed to be needed, in order to be successful in Ligue 1. Liverpool fans will remember Djibril Cisse who arrived at Anfield with a £14M price tag. Granted the player had injury problems, but Reds fans were shocked at his lack of close control and limited footballing brain. For Gerard Houllier’s counter-attacking ball over the top to run onto style, Cisse would have been perfect. But in a more complex footballing Rafael Benitez side, he came up short. 

The point isn’t that Cisse failed, because we can look to a dozen examples of French players succeeding, it is that his skills were perhaps symbolic of those needed to succeed in France and sure enough French clubs were the most interested when he became available again, now ending up at Marseille and regarded as one of the best forwards in Ligue 1. 

The performances of French clubs in Europe should be seen as unacceptable. They would be unacceptable from a country such as Portugal, so they must surely be unacceptable from one like France. The French league is reasonably wealthy and just last month struck an even better TV deal than the one it had previously had. Under the terms of the new contract running for some 4 years (2008-2012) Ligue 1 clubs will share €668M. This can’t of course compare to the English Premier League with its €2.2BN deal for 3 years of coverage. But, compared to leagues France should be seeing as its closest rivals in European competition, it’s a pretty decent deal. The Portuguese Bwin Liga whose clubs regularly achieve as much if not more than French sides in Europe earned just €45.7M for the 2005/06 season.

However, French clubs will still have to rely on developing young talent if they are to regain the middle ground in European football. Behind the Premier League, La Liga and Serie A, Die Bundesliga might be said to be the target to aim for. The German FA has recently concluded a deal that is expected to bring in €3BN for 6 years of coverage, working out at €500M per season. That should worry a French league that has already lost Franck Ribery and Willy Sagnol to the Bundesliga.

There can be no doubt that the talent to do better in Europe is still within French football and the reasons for its failure on the continental stage in recent seasons remains a subject of fierce debate, but the sooner this proud footballing nation punches its weight again, European football will be healthier for it.