French farce

France have crashed out of the World Cup in humiliating fashion.

First off, I have to say that I'm not surprised that France went out in the group stage. Bear in mind, this was a team who went out of Euro 2008 in the group stage (and iirc, after scoring only 1 goal) and only barely managed to qualify for WC2010. In addition, it was well known beforehand that the players didn't particularly like or respect Domenech. Now throw in the fact that it was public knowledge that Blanc would take up the France manager role after WC2010. All in all, not exactly a great recipe for success.

So, as I said, not exactly a surprise to see them go out at the group stage. However, it is the manner in which the France team imploded which has really impressed me.

In case you weren't aware, Anelka (who isn't exactly known for being well behaved) went postal on Domenech after being subbed at half-time in a game which France went on to lose 2-0. His comments were leaked to the press and after a storm of bad publicity, Anelka was sent home in disgrace. At this point, Evra also decided to go postal (he was very upset at the "traitor" in the team who leaked the comments to the press) and got into an argument with one of the coaches. The end result of all this was Evra leading the players onto the team bus and the entire team refusing to train for a day.

Thats right - in the middle of the World Cup, one of the Worlds most prestigious sporting events, this bunch of "professional" footballers decided that they weren't going to train for a day. Tossers!

Maybe its because I can't stand to work with people who don't have a professional attitude but this kind of thing just staggers me. Regardless of what else is going on, you tossers have a job to do and to simply decide not to attend training because you are unhappy is outrageous.

Evra has said that he will hold a press conference (or something) where he will explain what exactly went wrong. I can't wait for this to happen so I can see exactly what kind of pathetic loser he is. I know I shouldn't pre-judge but I really don't see what possible justification he would be able to offer which would excuse his actions.

The thing that surprises me the most though is that, despite most of the press (rightly) blaming the players for this fiasco, a lot of comments on forums seem to blame either Domenech or the French FA. The rationale for this seems to be that Domenech should have been able to control his players or the FFA should have removed Domenech from control after realising that he had lost the respect of the players.

Whichigawa?

I can understand putting blame on Domenech or the FFA if you were only complaining about the poor performance of France, for example, if France had been tactically naive or the players had been clearly unmotivated on the pitch. However, for the players to decide not to train for a day - this is solely on the players.

At the end of the day, regardless of how the players feel about Domenech or the FFA, they are supposed to be professionals with a job to do. If they didn't want to do that job, they should never have gone to South Africa in the first place.