Never had the French team appeared so beautiful and so ambitious before a competition. From Nicolas Batum to Vincent Collet, for the first time, we displayed our ambitions: we wanted to do better than bronze in 2019 at the World Cup, and better than the silver won at the Olympic Games, then at the Euro. Clearly, we were aiming for gold! A logical progression for one of the best basketball nations.
And then it all came crashing down! A good half against Canada, and then the black hole. First, a 30-point loss to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s teammates. ” A jerk off » for Evan Fournier, « a hook for Rudy Gobert. Overall, the comments were the same: you had to take a good slap to come back down to earth. Except that the French team dug their own grave in the last seven minutes of the match against Latvia. Leading by ten points without ever mastering their subject, France sank, and Latvia beat them to the post. A narrow defeat (86-88), synonymous with qualification for the Latvians, and elimination for the Blues.
A “political” problem?
Since Sunday evening, the “tauliers” as they are called and their coach have tried to find the words to explain this fiasco. For Rudy Gobert, it was a problem of state of mind. For him, the Blues forgot that it was necessary “get your hands dirty” to win. For Nicolas Batum, it is a more global problem, and without citing it, the Clippers winger mentioned the suspension of Thomas Heurtel, dismissed from the French team for having accepted a contract in Russia.
“Everyone must question themselves: players, coaches, federation, even up there. Everyone has to question themselves about what happened this summer and why it wasn’t good. We deprive ourselves of certain players, we lose players because of certain conditions. (…) The players, we messed up, of course, but there is a big questioning to be done for many, many people. I have one year left with this team. We need everyone in Paris, we need the best conditions. I don’t give a fuck about what’s political or whatever. We need the best possible French team. »
Since the withdrawal of Tony Parker, the French team has never won on his talent
For Collet, France has simply forgotten the meaning of the word “humility“. Maybe she also forgot that she has two interiors that can dominate under the circle, maybe she forgot what a delay screen was, maybe she forgot that the mastery of his nerves are essential in a big competition. Perhaps we had also forgotten that France had come out of it with miraculous victories at the Euro, and that it already did not master its subject.
“I didn’t say it loud enough before we started the competition but we can’t perform at this level in such a competitive concert if we don’t have the humility to fight. That doesn’t preclude ambition. Of course you also need talent, but what we’ve been able to do in recent years hasn’t just been about talent. To believe so would be a fundamental error. It was a constant job to be a great team. »
The Lessort soap opera
Perhaps also the soap opera Lessort disturbed the group. Absent during all the preparation, the interior of Pana landed in Jakarta without playing any friendly match, nor participating in any collective training. Vincent Collet kept saying that his profile was essential to the group. A real energizer. But how to integrate into a collective in a few days? How to modify rotations and a group that had worked during the preparation?
Outside, Evan Fournier was the tree that hides the forest in both games. As long as he put in, the team floated. And once he was muzzled or awkward, the Blues were non-existent. For what ? Perhaps because our collective does not make it possible to compensate for an individual drop in speed. Perhaps because we still do not know how to serve our interiors. Even when they have a warm hand like Guerschon Yabusele against Latvia. The Real Madrid strong winger scored 18 points, but only took 9 shots. It’s half as much as Fournier…
The use of Rudy Gobert
Finally, the evils of the preparation have never been corrected. Ailments that are not new, such as stray balls, rebounding, lack of movement in attack… The systems are executed in a school way, and poor Rudy Gobert is content to follow the circulation of the ball to take the lead. preferential position. Even when he is free, he does not necessarily receive the ball. As on this last action. Sylvain Francisco takes the 3-point for the win, while Gobert is alone, under the circle. An action symbol of a French team which has never really trusted its best player, and it does not date from yesterday, preferring to dream of a Joel Embiid or a Victor Wembanyama. The Wolves pivot took just one shot in the game. A dunk in the “money time”. Discretion which necessarily refers us to the words of Collet three weeks ago.
“I am convinced that inside, we have enough to dominate a lot of teams” explained the coach. “I already thought so last year, but we failed to exploit this potential. Because we did not have the necessary quality to put the ball inside. These are not obvious passes to make. This year, the two best passers returned [De Colo et Batum, ndlr] and you can see how it influences the game. And also the other players who didn’t necessarily put it on before… But it must also come from the inside players who have to take good positions. [Rudy] is taking better positions than last year, and as soon as [aujourd’hui], we will continue to work on this. »
In the end, for three weeks, nothing has been done, and the sanction has fallen.
