FIFA World Cup 2010 – France vs South Africa, France Face Humiliating 1-2 Defeat
Le Desordre est Complet. For those who have rusty French, that translates to: ‘the disorder is complete.’ And no other line could have borne the sentiment more clearly than that, as an abject France team crashed out of the World Cup; and that too not with a bang, but the faintest of whimpers.
There’s nothing like going down with a fight, and this was nothing like going down with a fight.
The Les Blues crashed to a humiliating defeat at the hands of the Bafana Bafana to complete a miserable tour of South Africa that had them in the headlines for more wrong reasons than the right ones.
Despite the win, South Africa still failed to qualify for the second round after Uruguay had done them a huge favour by beating Mexico by one goal to nil; a solitary Luis Suarez strike.
France could only muster 1 point from three games, and had only one goal to their credit, making this the second time in 3 attempts that they have crashed out of the World Cup in the first round. They also bowed out at the Japorea ’02 in the first round, and failed to score a single goal.
The French team returned to the pitch after a week of intense drama that saw their star striker’s dismissal from the squad, their Director FFF resigning, and a revolt from players where they refused to train in protest to Anelka’s dismissal.
Coach Raymond Domenech, who is set to make way for Laurent Blanc after the World Cup, made drastic changes to his side for the match; none more surprising than stripping Patrice Evra of the captaincy and handing Alou Diarra the armband. Cisse, Clichy, Gignac and Gourcuff were restored to the squad in place of Toulalan, Anelka, Malouda and Evra.
Evra was a lonely picture of sadness on the bench as he watched France going through the paces of another dreadful night in South Africa. However, their early exit from the tournament was nothing more than they deserved.
France, despite all the off-field drama, made a bright start to the match and could have been in front as early as in the third minute, when Gourcuff released Andre Pierre Gignac, but the Toulouse front-man hammered his shot straight at the keeper.
They paid a heavy price for that miss as in the 20th minute, a mistake by Lloris from a corner led to Khumalo’s goal from the corner, which led to pandemonium in the stadium.
France were rocked in the 26th minute when Gourcuff’s shift was cut short via a harsh red card by Colombian referee Oscar Ruiz for an aerial challenge on Macbeth Sibaya, and the Les Blues were reduced to 10 men.
Domenech could not believe what was happening on the pitch, and was holding his head in his hands while going berserk on the touchline.
South Africa were growing in confidence and threatened to grab the game by the scruff of the neck as they unleashed one attack after another.
Bafana Bafana finally took full advantage of the man advantage as they doubled their lead before half-time, when Mphela clipped the ball over Lloris after being sent clear by a superb through ball from the midfield by Bernard Parker.
Steven Pienaar also netted the ball, but his effort was ruled out for a foul inside the box.
As France threw on more attackers on the pitch with Malouda and Henry replacing Gignac and Cisse, they finally got a goal back in the 55th minute when Ribery squared a ball to Florent Malouda who was in acres of space in front of a gaping goal.
But it was too little too late for the French team, as the hosts held on to win the game by 2 goals to one.
The win, in the end, proved to be no more than a consolation win for South Africa, who go out courtesy of an inferior goal difference to Mexico.
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