It was a striking image, the picture that best captured France’s World Cup campaign to this point. Not the one that caught Michael Olise in full flight as he executed a perfect bicycle kick that only sprang ungratefully off a Swedish post. Nor the one of the squad posing together on their private jet, turqoise hoods drawn tight to their chins. Instead it was the one of the hug, first between Kylian Mbappé and Didier Deschamps, and then with the rest of the squad too, as they celebrated the opening goal of their 3-0 last-32 victory over Sweden in a purposeful manner.
Deschamps said later that Mbappé’s dash towards the technical area had “touched me deeply”. The head coach had briefly stepped back from his duties the week before to grieve the loss of his mother. Mbappé and the squad had wanted publicly to show how much he meant to them. “The group is united,” Deschamps said. “They delivered when I was away and now I’m back, they know I’m here 100%. Team spirit doesn’t win you matches but it can help you lose them. The collective strength is above everything and Kylian is the best shining example.”
The French are generally held to be comfortable with public displays of affection, so perhaps one more from their football team might otherwise go unnoticed. But while the affinity between the France squad and head coach is deep and precedes even their World Cup victory of 2018, the emphasis on collective spirit is serving a very practical purpose for the favourites in this tournament.
No one will need to tell Deschamps, his team, or anyone in France, that internal discord has damaged Les Bleus before. The most notorious incident remains the rancour between squad and coaching staff that erupted during the 2010 World Cup. Criticism of Nicolas Anelka by Raymond Domenech, and Anelka’s subsequent rebuke of his coach, led to the player being expelled, the squad refusing to train and ultimately a tournament exit at the group stage. The postmortem revealed deep fault lines between players and management, as well as suggestions of racial tension.
Now, in 2026, it is not that there is no longer any racism, but Les Bleus are united against it. Mbappé has become the focus of the familiar criticism directed at athletes who speak out on social and political issues, in this case the French far right. Mbappé has been warned to stay in his lane and clearly felt the rancour that has been directed at him, rejecting suggestions he should enter politics because “I’m already hated enough as it is”. But the support Mbappé has received from his coach has been unequivocal. The same goes for every member of the squad, with Deschamps expressing only the utmost support for his players. They will benefit from this kind of backing of course, but it’s not a given it should happen. And, while Deschamps has clearly leaned into the pastoral aspect of his role this summer, he has been met in the middle by his squad. There is mutual trust within the group and a bond that is constantly being reinforced by actions such as the group hug at the MetLife.
It seems clear that this mentality is also being leveraged by Deschamps to deliver on his tactical plan. France have come into this tournament with four out-and-out attackers on the pitch. They have done so before, in 2022, but at the last European Championship France reverted to a less open 4-3-3 and Deschamps has always had a keen eye on making sure his team have been, first and foremost, hard to beat. It appears that in the US, the head coach believes he can achieve the goals of being both secure and adventurous, that he can give the people – and most likely much of his squad – what they want. In return he will demand a lot from his players.
It has been the occasional highlight of this tournament to see Mbappé harrying an opponent back down the field to recover the ball. This is not something he is famous for, to say the least. The three PSG forwards he plays alongside, and Olise of Bayern Munich, are already familiar with a full-throttle counter-pressing regime of course. But a quartet that could easily appear an indulgence is now enacting a plan that has allowed France to cruise comfortably through games.
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Deschamps has put trust in his players. His players are demonstratively giving him that trust back. It’s a sign of sophisticated management by the wily France coach who appears to be enjoying his swansong in international management. It’s also a feather in the cap for Mbappé.
Deschamps presented Mbappé with a shirt commemorating his 100th cap over dinner on Thursday. The 27-year-old has been captain of France since 2023 but he is also now clearly their leader. He is taking on responsibility and doing it with a smile. And that is likely to spell danger for everyone else.
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