They were incredible calm at half-time
Imagine England had got to the final and were 2-1 up at half-time. Not only would the country be descending into anarchy, the players would probably, understandable, be overwhelmed with nerves.
That was not the case in the France dressing room on Sunday night, as they went in at the break 2-1 up against Croatia. The players were calm and collected, and were given sound advice by their manager Didier Deschamps.
Footage of Deschamps’ half-time team talk has been released. In the video, he is seen instructing the players not to stoop to Croatia’s aggressive tactics, to lay off Mario Mandžukić, and to play as simply as possible.
Antoine Griezmann was also told to drop deeper when Croatia attacked, instead of staying close to the other forwards, to act as an outlet when France recovered the ball.
Griezmann and Raphael Varane both spoke up too, offering calming words to the rest of the team.
Going by how the second half went, it seemed to work.
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