He is still to this day the record holder for the number of goals scored during a final phase of the World Cup (13) in 1958. Just Fontaine died on Wednesday at the age of 89, we learned from from his family. French international 21 times, Fontaine was one of the heroes of the 58 World Cup in Sweden where the Blues had reached the semi-finals for the first time in their history, beaten by Brazil Pelé. With the death of Fontaine, there are only three survivors of the 1958 epic (Dominique Colonna, Robert Mouynet, Bernard Chiarelli).
Just Fontaine will forever be associated with his mythical and almost unbeatable record, the culmination of a career essentially marked by his time in Reims. The 1958 World Cup in Sweden is the masterpiece of “Justo” and will be for a long time the absolute reference of French football before the advent of the Platini, Zidane and Mbappé generations.
Choice list
Last representative of the attacking trident he formed with Raymond Kopa and Roger Piantoni, who died in 2017 and 2018, Fontaine, alongside the two other stars of Reims, had taken the Blues to the semi-finals where a certain Pelé, 17, had shattered their dream with a hat-trick. Brazil, future winner of the tournament, wins 5-2 and the legend of the “King” is on the move, but France will console themselves with a third place, carried by a Fontaine in a state of grace and author of a fabulous quadruple against to Germany (6-3). The Blues hold their first feat of arms on the international scene and the native of Marrakech, on August 18, 1933, goes down in history. If the Tricolores have since managed to do much better by settling on the roof of the world in 1998 then 2018, Fontaine’s feat today seems totally unreal and inaccessible.
And yet, this rather stocky striker (1.74 m), both surface fox before the hour and gunner, was not intended to compete in the event, preceded in the hierarchy in blue by Thadée Cisowski. But the latter is injured at the last moment. “It was only at the airport before leaving for Sweden that Paul Nicolas (manager of the France team, editor’s note) and Albert Batteux (one of the coaches), who didn’t really want me, m ‘said I would play centre-forward’Fontaine told AFP in 2013.
In addition to his 13 goals and the first international medal for the French team gleaned in Sweden, Fontaine has also built a list of choice in clubs with four titles of champion of France (one with Nice, three with Reims), two Cups de France and a European Cup final for champion clubs lost with Reims in 1959 (2-0) against the great Real Madrid of Di Stefano, Puskas and friend Kopa.
And “oldest brother” confided “Justo” to AFP at the time of the disappearance of the illustrious playmaker of the Blues in 2017. “Raymond had character, me too and it made a magical duo.” However, Fontaine’s career as a player came to an abrupt end in 1962 at only 28 years old after two double fractures of a leg.
Two matches at the head of the Blues
“We talk a lot about my record but I would have exchanged it for five or six years more, because football was my passion. I was at the top, making a lot of money for the time. It was not the current sums, I earned five times the minimum wage, now it would be more like a hundred times., he explained in 2013. Withdrawn from the field, Fontaine becomes a coach, but his time on the bench will be quite mixed. His name is engraved in the annals for a performance much less glorious than his 13 goals in the World Cup: he only held two matches at the head of the France team in 1967, before being ejected after two defeats in friendly.
His experience at PSG (1973-1976) was more successful with a rise to the 1st division in 1974. Carried in triumph by the supporters, he had an illness that remained in the legend of the Parisian club. He completes his life as a technician in his native Moroccan land, offering a third place at the CAN 1980 to the Atlas Lions.
A peaceful retiree, the former striker had kept a watchful eye on football news, claiming to watch all the matches on television, even if he was diminished by illness in the last years of his life. In 2011, he was invited by then coach Laurent Blanc to Clairefontaine, as a glorious elder, to preach the good word to the Blues, a year after the Knysna fiasco.
Updated: 12:11 p.m.added elements of Just Fontaine’s life.