{"id":11108,"date":"2012-06-05T10:50:37","date_gmt":"2012-06-05T08:50:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/06\/soccer-euro-president-blanc-campaigns-for-new-term\/"},"modified":"2012-06-05T10:50:37","modified_gmt":"2012-06-05T08:50:37","slug":"soccer-euro-president-blanc-campaigns-for-new-term","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/soccer-euro-president-blanc-campaigns-for-new-term\/","title":{"rendered":"Soccer-Euro-&#8216;President&#8217; Blanc campaigns for new term"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>By Gregory Blachier<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"articleLocation\">PARIS, June 5<\/span> (Reuters) &#8211; Laurent Blanc will be trying to<br \/>\nrestore France&#8217;s reputation at the European Championship.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The former world and European champion was named France<br \/>\ncoach in the aftermath of their dismal 2010 World Cup campaign<br \/>\nin South Africa, where France recorded two defeats and one draw,<br \/>\nwith the players staging a strike to support Nicolas Anelka<br \/>\nafter he was kicked out of the squad for insulting then coach<br \/>\nRaymond Domenech.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Blanc was dubbed &#8220;the president&#8221; during his glorious years as<br \/>\na player yet it remains to be seen whether Euro 2012 will also<br \/>\nserve as his bid for re-election.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>He has been at the France helm for two years and his contract<br \/>\nmay be extended should Les Bleus perform well. There is no<br \/>\nguarantee of that, however, but hopes remain high even though<br \/>\nthey failed to win a single game in the Euro 2008 and 2010 World<br \/>\nCup finals.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Moreover, while French Football Federation (FFF) president<br \/>\nNoel Le Graet wants to see how France&#8217;s Euro campaign unfolds,<br \/>\nBlanc himself has been linked by the media to several top<br \/>\nEuropean clubs. His CV though has certainly been boosted by the<br \/>\nway things have improved since 2010.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>With one relatively easy looking friendly to play, against<br \/>\nEstonia in Le Mans, France were unbeaten in 20 matches since<br \/>\nSeptember 2010 and that run will be extended to 21 games if they<br \/>\navoid an unlikely defeat against Estonia.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Blanc has certainly steadied the ship after the FFF spent<br \/>\nalmost a million euros to fire Domenech, with the 46-year-old<br \/>\nsigning a two-year deal with the objective of leading France to<br \/>\nEuro 2012.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Blanc is a discreet, almost secretive figure, who takes a<br \/>\nforensic approach to his job, considering every angle, but<br \/>\nmaintains a distance from his players.<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Gregory Blachier PARIS, June 5 (Reuters) &#8211; Laurent Blanc will be trying to restore France&#8217;s reputation at the European Championship. The former world and European champion was named France coach in the aftermath of their dismal 2010 World Cup campaign in South Africa, where France recorded two defeats and one draw, with the players [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-11108","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11108\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}