French Football Federation (FFF) launches inquiry for 2010 World Cup fiasco in South Africa
It is finally clear that French President Nickolas Sarkozy is not the man who is reviewing and trying to resolve the dilemma and embarrassment that the French faced at the FIFA 2010 World Cup in South Africa. The French Football Federation (FFF) has properly initiated the reviewing process of the disaster the France orchestrated during the tournament in South Africa.
The latest news has confirmed that French forward Nicolas Anelka has been named amongst the 5 French players that have to appear before the Disciplinary Commission of the French Football Federation (FFF). This hearing is supposed to take place on Friday and the main agenda on the board will be the explanation of the French team’s protest strike prior to the practice session before the game against South Africa.
The French went into the tournament as the 2006 World Cup finalist where they had lost to Italy. The French squad included many star players and it was expected that they would at least proceed to the latter stages.
However, a very different story was narrated in the World Cup where they went goalless against Uruguay and then faced a humiliating 2-0 defeat against Mexico. In the final match of the group stages against South Africa, the French were supposed to bounce back with a 4-0 defeat in order to qualify. But after the first half of the match, they were 2 goals down. In the end, France was defeated 2-1 which knocked them out of the tournament.
Scathing criticism was showered on the French coach Raymond Domenech. His team selection was opined to be the main issue as he had omitted Samir Nasri, Karim Benzema and Patrick Vieira from the team. Apart from that, his poor display of tactics and behaviour was the second factor that should have been constantly reviewed.
But there was a thing that added more misery to the already spoiled French broth and that was when the French coach called off Anelka from the field who had used profanity against him. In response, the coach sent him back to France and that was followed by outrage from Captain Patrice Evra. The player nearly got into a brawl from with the team’s fitness trainer but it was stopped. After that, the entire team decided to quit practice and went back to their hotels.
All this made a huge scene in front of the world. French President Sarkozy decided to be the saviour but his intervention further aggravated the situation when he called upon private meetings with all the incident related players. FIFA warned the French President to stop as government involvement in football is not allowed by the body otherwise the country could face a ban from the organization. Eventually, they did back off and let the FFF decide the team’s fate.
The sending off of the 31-year-old Chelsea striker had implications of its own and caused a lot of reverberations of the incident which made the other 22 members of his team flare up.
French skipper Patrice Evra, Franck Ribery, Eric Abidal, Jeremy Toulalan and Nikolas Anelka have been called up by the President for their actions and their refusal to train in the practice session. FFF has set the 17th of August for another meeting and they will decide the fate of the players.
FFF has revealed that the five players are on top of their list because of their roles in the strike and therefore they should be the first ones to explain their actions. They have further conveyed that Evra has been reprimanded because he is also the captain of the team along with Ribery as he is the vice captain of the team. Abidal has been called up because of his key role in refusing to train and Jeremy Toulalan for writing down and delivering the declaration in which the team boycotted the practice.
The inquiry sitting on Friday is also going to review other players and try to resolve the jeopardy they have placed the country’s football in. Also, newly appointed coach Laurent Blanc has revealed that further punishment is expected to be imposed on the players. When asked if that would affect the team play, he announced that it will not have any such effect and they will be able to qualify for Euro 2012.
As punishment for their actions, the French team from South Africa is barred from the first friendly match against Norway on 11th August. While this goes on, two other French players are still facing a trial for s*x charges. Ribery and Benzema were accused of underage prostitution with Zahia Dehar and are undergoing a case which could land them up in prison for three years.
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