About 900 inhabitants counts Clairefontaine-en-Yvelines. In the middle of Forest Romania de Rambouillet, a forest of around 50 kilometers southwest of Paris, the small place is with great importance. Most houses are on the main road, the last bus stops at half nine. Thierry Henry and Dylan Mbappé spent a considerable part of their teenage time here.
Here, in the middle of the forest, the national team is often prepared for international matches, here the team also opened their quarters during the European Championship — and many are well known the place before their first nomination. In 1988, the French Football Association in Clairefontaine installed the Center National Du Football (CNF), a performance center for which it is envied throughout Europe. What the DFB is planning with its end of 2021 academy, there has been in France for over 30 years.
Without Clairefontaine, so many say in France, it would certainly not have given the World Cup title in 1998. And maybe the 2018 may not.
2018 France could have sent two teams to the World Cup
The tournament three years ago, the fruits of the junior work of the French Football Association has shown an impressive way. But not only manifests by the dominance of the Équipe Tricolore. Almost just as remarkably overlooking the big whole: At the final round in Russia, there was a total of more born in France, which were not world champion.
According to an investigation of the Australian scientist Dark Music, 52 World Cup participants were born from 2018 in France and largely trained there. Only 22 of them stood in the French squad, 30 ran for other national teams. France could, one could say, can send two teams to the world's largest national tournament. For comparison: in second place of this ranking follows Brazil with 28 players (23 + 5).
A huge pool on top players
This statistic is even more impressive, considering that National Coach Didier Deschamps's did not nominee players like Karim Benzema, Alexandre Lafayette, Anthony Martial or Kingsley Coman. And that in Eden Hazard an actor got the Silver Ball for the second-best player of the tournament, which was not born in France, but was trained in Lille from the age of 14 in Lille.
At the start of the European Championship final round, the reigning world champion was again considered a top favorite, the modernist read as an all-star team of European club football: Marine, Yoga, Kane, Woman, Dembélé, Riemann, Mbappé — and again Benzema. For Leipzig's Day Upamecano, Milan's Theo Hernandez or Rennes' Mega-talent Eduardo Camping was simply no place in the 26er squad, highly assisted Bundesliga professionals such as Ibrahima Donate, Christopher Skunk or Mousse Diary have not yet completed a single A country. The pool on top players is huge.
Back to Clairefontaine. Every year in October, the institute National Du Football (INF) residue, a part of the CNF, starts a recruitment process. He lasts until April. Around 2000 talented junior players aged 12 to 13 years from the Greater Paris applied to a place in the Academy, a maximum of 25 are selected per vintage, then stay there two years. At this age, young people in their motor development should be the fastest way to learn. Reformation is called this process.
Even the age of the bones is determined
In the last stage of the selection process even X-rays of the wrists of the applicants are made to determine the age of the bones. Thus, the physical potential of the youth players should be recorded so that late developer does not fall through the grid. Random is a foreign word in Clairefontaine.
Talent's in the middle of the forest: The seclusion of the Center National Du Football in Clairefontaine makes its contribution to the success of French junior promotion. Getty Images
The French association not only knows exactly how the highly gifted players are promoting. You also know where to find them. It seems macabre, but the great success of French football is at least partially together with the failure of French social policy.
Here we get the talented players
Tom Farley, Managing Director of the Sports & Society Program at the renowned Aspen Institute, reported in a report published in 2018 from a meeting with André Marble, the Director of Young Promotion of the French Football Association. Marble in his office in Clairefontaine painted a point on a notepad and thereby pulled a circle. The point is for Paris, the circle for the suburbs, the so-called Balloons. Here, Marble should have told him while hatching the circle, we get the talented players. There, in the high-rise settlements around Paris, the social stress is great, the perspective is just bad for immigrant cap.
A World Cup under cities would be quite one-sided
There is only football there, said Paul Pogba 2018 of the Financial Times. Whether at school or in the neighborhood, everyone plays football. It helps people in the neighborhood to do nothing stupid. Yoga must know it, he comes from the Balloon of Paris. Like Dylan Mbappé. Like N'Gold Kane. Like Thierry Henry. Also like Kingsley Coman, Mousse Diary or Riyadh Mare, who plays for Algeria. The list could be continued for a long time. Alone eleven the 26 players from the current EM squad come from the metropolitan region of Paris.
Looking at the last six World Championships, according to the investigation of scientists Music, even 60 players native of Paris — with a distance from most. If a World Cup would not be played under origin of origin, but under original cities, they would probably be quite one-sided. The Balloons are a driving force for talents. And so bitter the reasons for social perspective may be — the association knows exactly.
No smartphones for the chosen
In Clairefontaine, the chosen from Monday to Friday after the school is coached from the best youth coaches of the country. There is nothing missing. At the weekend it goes to the home clubs, only for the games. The seclusion of the place far away from the attempts of the big city contributes to the fact that the young people can concentrate completely on their goals, as the former Inf-Manager Jean-Claude Large said last year in a bandage interview. Smartphones? Bay in the morning and only spent at 20 o'clock.
The list of top players with Clairefontaine past is long. In addition to Henry and Mbappé, Nicolas Angela, Blaine Matrix or Alphonse Areola were here, also current Bundesliga professionals like Raphael Guerrero, Jerome Bouillon, Marcus Thu ram or Skunk ran through the Elite program at Inf. Here, only the best players are recruited from the Greater Paris. The idea of elite promotion by the Reformation is used nationwide. Distributed over the whole of France, there are a total of 15 of these bases.
The cornerstones for training there are the same everywhere: Tempo and technology. The speed with and without ball is very important to us, explains Large. Kevin Holland is likely to agree with him. When the German EM participant, in the Bundesliga truly not known as a slower player, changed last year to Ligue 1, he initially pumped like a marketer whether the high tempo. There are a lot of fast players on the square, many one-counter-one situations, fully explained in the podcast World meets DAZN. From Germany you are more likely to move team-tactically.
Why can't the life 1 benefit?
The question that implements in this context: If this nation has a sheer inexhaustible pool at top talents, why does the Ligue 1 lag the other big leagues behind? Why did only six of the 26 nominees of the European Champion played in the domestic league? Why are the Romans, the Dembélé, the Upamecanos France still in teenage?
French Connection: FC Bayern won the Champions League 2020 with equal five French players in the squad. Imago images
For a moment you could answer: because it is no different.
Surely the Ligue 1 could open to the remaining large leagues. Just theoretically. Because many clubs simply remains no choice when selling their many top players abroad. The then Champions League semi-finalist Olympic Lyon, for example, stated Lucas Court to Berlin because it is dependent on the money.
Financially, except debt-financed clubs from Paris and Monaco — the clubs of the other European top leagues in part are sometimes far behind. With Lille OSC this year was a club Master, who had just undergone bankruptcy despite regular participation in European competitions last winter.
That you get them, shows the quality of our education and the ability of our players.
France National coach Didier Deschamps's over the Germany legionnaire
The auditor's revenues of the clubs are far not as high in France as elsewhere, especially in the south of the country's football does not enjoy the absolute monopoly position in the viewers as in England or Germany due to the high popularity of rugby sports. The fact that the Ligue-1-season 2019/20 was aborted prematurely because of the pandemic as the only top 5 league and that a TV deal continued to burst, the situation for the future should not shape rosy. Due to the economic situation of many clubs, Ligue 1 will be reduced from 2023 to 18 clubs.
The many talents in this situation are the capital of clubs, the resale to Germany, Spain or England the basis of existence. That you get them, shows the quality of our education and the ability of our players, said France's national coach Didier Deschamps in May in the World interview. But it also shows the high investment that flows into youth work in France — for example, with Germany.
We have the business model here that you can buy a young player designed abroad and then sell it expensive again, said U-21 Success Trainer Stefan Kurtz at the end of 2020 at World meets DAZN. And abroad he would have been able to replace France just as well if the abundance of young French players in the Bundesliga.
Along twelve French at the age of 21 or younger, Kurtz settled, would end up in the market value ranking of the central defenders at transfermarkt.DE before the most expensive German player of this age group. That was, according to Kurtz, in all legitimate criticism of these designed market values but somewhere meaningful — especially as five of the twelve French in the Bundesliga are under contract.
The most expensive German players of this ranking listed by Kurtz was by the way Bochum Armed Bella Ketchup. He was born in Paris.
(This text first appeared on June 15, 2021)
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