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Only one of the French starting lineup for the Euro 2000 final currently plays at home. Standing from left: Zinedine Zidane, Laurent Blanc, Patrick Vieira, Marcel Desailly, Christophe Dugarry and Lilian Thuram. Bottom from left: Thierry Henry, Youri Djorkaeff, captain Didier Deschamps, goalkeeper Fabien Barthez and Bixente Lizarazu
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Coaches Who Lead by Example
Great football managers are les Bleus' other export
By BRUCE CRUMLEY
January 21, 2002
Think of them as the by-products of the French football factory: the production line that spews out a plethora of outstanding players also churns out plenty of world-class coaches. The World Cup will serve as a showcase for the country's managerial surplus, with Frenchmen at the helm of four of the 32 squads bound for Asia. "It's a great tribute to the French development system," says former French star Didier Deschamps, who last year ended his playing career to become head coach of Monaco. "Since national teams can't recruit French players, they recruit French coaches."
At Korea/Japan 2002, French gaffer Roger Lemerre will be joined—in battle—by compatriot coaches Henri Michel (Tunisia), Bruno Metsu (Senegal) and Philippe Troussier (co-host Japan). These men are part of a long list of French managers whose personal success and exposure to France's remarkable player-development program won them jobs guiding national teams, professional clubs—and occasionally, as in Troussier's case, improving the entire structure of a country's soccer system. Troussier's three-year drive to recast the Japan Football Association a la français has already begun to bear fruit: under the 46-year-old Frenchman's guidance, perennial under-achiever Japan has compiled a respectable record of 18 wins, 11 draws and 10 losses.
Troussier got the job on the recommendation of another foreign veteran of Japan, Arsène Wenger, the acclaimed French coach of the English club Arsenal. One of France's first coaching exports, Wenger moved from J-League side Nagoya Grampus Eight to the Gunners in 1996, and promptly turned the London club into a veritable colony of expat French stars. Within two years, he had walked off with both the English Premiership title and the Football Association Cup. His bid to another F.A. cup was thwarted last year by Liverpool, under the coaching of another Frenchman, Gérard Houllier. An architect of the French national training system, Houllier revamped and restructured a rusty Liverpool organization to win a rash of national and international titles last year. This year, the English Premier League got its third French manager: Jean Tigana, of the London club Fulham.
Other European leagues aren't as keen as England on French coaches, but the Gallic touch is finding takers farther afield. Claude Le Roy, who coached Cameroon's 1998 World Cup side, has signed on at Shanghai's Cosco, while Manuel Amoros, who collected 82 caps with les Bleus, has taken the helm at the Tunisian club Sfax. If the foursome at the World Cup draw good performances from their teams, the football factory may find orders for its by-products mirroring the demand for its main export.
—With reporting by Shintaro Kano/Tokyo and Kate Noble/London
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