The Mexican wave

France is in trouble at the World Cup, and the situation is entirely of its own making. The rifts within the French camp and the ineffectual work of the coach, Raymond Domenech, were laid bare in a goal-less game against Uruguay last week and confirmed in the 2-0 loss to Mexico on Thursday.

Not to take anything away from Mexico, whose team deserved its victory over France. But the game in Polokwane emphasised that the French are not a team. The players’ inability to pull together at times looked like indifference to the cause, never mind the reported squabbles with their coach.

The Mexicans had a similar problem last year with their Swedish coach, Sven-Goran Eriksson. His cautious management style sought to remove the risk that is fundamental to Mexico. But the Mexicans need to express themselves, to flirt a little in their play, to perform on the edges of disaster.

Eriksson thought he could soothe the Mexicans, but instead he confused them. In those circumstances, with World Cup qualification ebbing away, Mexico’s soccer federation paid off Eriksson and reinstalled Javier Aguirre, a former national coach who knows very well how to fire up his people.

Moreover, no other coach was given better access to his players than Aguirre.
All of Mexico’s players except for Rafael Marquez, who plays for Barcelona, and other players who are based in Europe were called into camp 60 days before the World Cup. That old-fashioned idea of withdrawing players to live, breathe and concentrate on nothing but a World Cup was perfected by Brazil decades ago.

Provided the players like, or can tolerate, one another — and provided they are comfortable under the coach — isolation can bring a vital advantage at the tournament.
France, in contrast, knew that some players disliked Domenech. Some are baffled by him. And some were unable to put their differences aside to perform here to anything like their club form.

On Thursday, we witnessed a harmonious, adventurous Mexico and a France divided and in decline, the result of a failure of management above the level of the coach.
France is a notoriously slow starter at World Cups. It was in 1998 when, on home soil, it slowly found its rhythm to win the Cup in Paris. It started slowly again in 2006, when Les Bleus tied their first two games, against Switzerland and South Korea, yet it once again reached the final. It lost on penalty kicks against Italy in Berlin.

A factor in both of those was Zinedine Zidane’s leadership quality. Zidane could, regardless of the coach, lift his colleagues by example, and by desire. After Zidane, we get Thierry Henry. An undoubted talent, the top scorer in France’s history, Henry has been a sullen bystander at this World Cup. He was demoted to the bench for two reasons.

First, his form has never been the same since he departed Arsenal for Barcelona, leaving his mentor, Arsene Wenger, behind. Second, as Henry told the French daily L’Equipe last autumn: “I have been in the France team for 12 years, and never have I been in this situation. We do not know how to play, where to go. There is no organisation. There is no style, no guidance, no identity.”

All this discontent was met with inertia on the part of the French soccer federation. It did nothing to challenge or replace Domenech.

Mexico, by contrast, made the necessary change with its leadership. The team, El Tri, referring to the team’s colors of green, red and white, responded to Aguirre’s return to the position he held once before. “I have the best generation of footballers that Mexico has ever had,” he said. “These guys want to make history, and it’s in their hands.”

That is old coaching rhetoric: build them up, lift their self-esteem. And if the players believe only half of what is said, they might perform with confidence. Two examples of that have been the vivid, attacking brio of left back Carlos Salcido and the striking impact of Javier Hernandez, a 22-year-old known as Chicharito who is about to leave Guadalajara for Manchester United. Salcido had more attempts on goal on Thursday than any Frenchman; the speedy Hernandez beat the offside trap to score the first goal.

There might be criticism of Aguirre for holding back Hernandez on the bench until his preferred striker, Guillermo Franco, missed chances. But when a coach demonstrates who is in charge, and why, we hear no discontent.

This is where the French must answer to themselves. It has been obvious for years that Domenech has whimsical notions about players’ zodiac signs, for example. Shortly after taking over as coach in 2004, Domenech ended the international career of winger Robert Pires, saying he distrusted Scorpios.

“All parameters have to be considered, and I have added one by saying there is astrology involved,” he later said. “When I have got a Leo in defence, I’ve always got my gun ready, as I know he’s going to want to show off at one moment or another and cost us.” His entire defence at one stage was born under the constellation Leo.

And it is also evident that his irrational tactics confuse players. But the federation, afraid to let go a man whose previous team reached the 2006 final, failed to react to the plain obvious. France is on course to repeat 2002, when, in South Korea and Japan, it went out in the first round, without a goal, without a victory, without justifying its talents.

“It’s shameful to lose like that,” said Florent Malouda, the winger Domenech dropped against Uruguay but restored against Mexico. “We can’t leave a tournament without winning a match.”

Domenech acknowledged as much. “We need a miracle now,” he said. “We have to at least play for our honour. When we are forced to rely on others, there’s nothing to say.”
The team’s fate is out of its hands. No matter what France does against South Africa in Bloemfontein on Tuesday, the World Cup is over for both teams, barring some extraordinary turnaround. Mexico and Uruguay need only tie their match in Rustenburg at the same hour to take first and second place in the group.