France gave something special to absent coach Deschamps, Stephan says
Soccer Football – FIFA World Cup 2026 – Group I – Norway v France – Boston Stadium, Foxborough, Massachusetts, U.S. – June 26, 2026 Interim France coach Guy Stephan celebrates after the match REUTERS/Mike Segar
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FOXBOROUGH, Massachusetts, June 26 : France’s World Cup players wanted to do something special to show support for coach Didier Deschamps after the death of his mother and they did just that with an emphatic 4-1 win over Norway on Friday, assistant national coach Guy Stephan said.
“Obviously all my thoughts go to Didier. I will call him later. We are all happy that he will be back with the team shortly. He will be at training tomorrow afternoon,” Stephan told reporters.
With Deschamps back home for his mother’s funeral, France cruised to victory thanks to a first-half hat-trick by Ousmane Dembele and a stoppage-time header from Desire Doue.
Both teams had already qualified for the first knockout round of the tournament but France were determined to top the group to avoid a more hectic travel schedule ahead.
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“All the players did what they had to do,” Stephan said. “Given that they are very close to Didier, the players wanted to do something special today on the pitch.”
Stephan – who was hired by Deschamps as his assistant at Ligue 1 club Olympique de Marseille in 2009 and went with him to the France national team three years later – said he saw some areas of concern in his side’s performance against a Norway side that were missing almost all of their regular starters who were given a rest ahead of the Round of 32 by coach Stale Solbakken.
“What I liked a little bit less, if you want to be a little bit on the perfectionist side, is that there were times when things got easy and then we didn’t run as much and we ended up with situations where we gave opportunities to the opponents,” he said.
“This is something we need to work on as the opponents are going to get better. I’m not saying that Norway isn’t a good quality team, but they didn’t have their A team today.”
(Writing by William SchombergEditing by Christian Radnedge)
Source: Reuters
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