{"id":11109,"date":"2012-06-05T10:50:38","date_gmt":"2012-06-05T08:50:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/06\/soccer-euro-france-surge-into-contention-in-final-straight\/"},"modified":"2012-06-05T10:50:38","modified_gmt":"2012-06-05T08:50:38","slug":"soccer-euro-france-surge-into-contention-in-final-straight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/soccer-euro-france-surge-into-contention-in-final-straight\/","title":{"rendered":"Soccer-Euro-France surge into contention in final straight"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

By Julien Pretot<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

PARIS, June 5<\/span> (Reuters) – Despite a style of play that has
\nnot exactly filled the fans with enthusiasm, France go into the
\nEuro 2012 finals as potential winners only two years after the
\nfiasco that ruined their World Cup in South Africa.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

A 2-1 win against Germany in Bremen in February showed Les
\nBleus, who were unbeaten in 20 games after a 2-0 win over Serbia
\nlast week, would definitely be a force to be reckoned with at
\nthe finals – even though some of their performances in the
\nqualifers left something to be desired.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

France looked likely to extend that unbeaten run to 21
\nmatches against Estonia on Tuesday, six days before facing
\nEngland in their opening match in Donetsk.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

“Everybody was a bit scared before the Germany game and
\neveryone has been pleasantly surprised by our match and by the
\nresult,” said France coach Laurent Blanc, who took over from
\nRaymond Domenech after Les Bleus were knocked out in the first
\nround following off-pitch drama.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Domenech lost control of his squad in South Africa, with
\nstriker Nicolas Anelka being kicked out after insulting the
\ncoach at halftime in France’s 2-0 defeat against Mexico.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Almost two years later, the former world and European
\nchampions have regained composure.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

“It is nice to win in Germany but we still have a lot of work
\nto do to perform well,” said Blanc. “The victory in Bremen
\nshowed we are able to raise our level on one game. But I say one
\ngame. Whether we can do it throughout a competition is another
\nquestion.”<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Blanc’s first ambition was to win one game in a group
\nfeaturing old foes England, Sweden and co-hosts Ukraine, who
\nthey demolished 4-1 in a friendly in Donetsk last June.
\n\u00a0 Continued…<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Julien Pretot PARIS, June 5 (Reuters) – Despite a style of play that has not exactly filled the fans with enthusiasm, France go into the Euro 2012 finals as potential winners only two years after the fiasco that ruined their World Cup in South Africa. A 2-1 win against Germany in Bremen in February […]<\/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-11109","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\/11109","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=11109"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11109\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}