It’s finish ! The dream flew away, turned into a nightmare in a few points, in a few minutes. While France was leading 2 sets to 1, had the match in its big hands and seemed to take the direction of Poland, the host country of the last four of the competition, it ended up giving in, by cracking, at the worst moment. This Wednesday, after a terrible duel, Barthélémy Chinenyeze’s partners lost after five hard-fought sets (26-24, 21-25, 25-23, 22-25, 12-15) in the Stozice Arena in Ljubljana (Slovenia) in the quarter-finals of the World Cup. The Blues had not lost in the quarter-finals of a major competition for almost 10 years – during Euro 2013. An eternity and a terrible disappointment.
It is therefore not this year that France will bring the World Cup home. European champions in 2015, three-time winners of the Nations League and Olympic champions last summer, Earvin Ngapeth’s partners have never won this competition. France has only reached the last four of a World Cup twice in its history: in 2002 when it left tanned and in 2014 when it failed at the foot of the podium.
It is also the first quack, the first failure, for the Italian coach Andrea Giani since his arrival on the bench of the France team in the spring. This summer, for his baptism of fire, he led the Blues to a new title in the League of Nations.
“It’s the first defeat for us and the new staff, but we are above all disappointed because we had a good tournament, blows the libero Jenia Grebennikov. We will analyze what happened and learn the lessons to come back stronger. After that it will be up to the staff to make choices and it is up to us to perform in our clubs during the season. Our main objective remains the Paris Games in 2024 (Editor’s note: where France will try to retain its title). We also have a Euro to play next year. In a sports career, you always have to know how to bounce back. »
This dream poster, this early final against Italy, European champions 12 months ago, has kept all its promises. Until the end. After having often been scared since the start of the competition – and in particular saved a match point on Monday against Japan in the round of 16 – France had nevertheless regained its game, its magic, this enthusiasm so communicative – and a little luck like this ace from Antoine Brizard where the ball hits the net in the 2nd set – at the start of the match.
But at the end of a terrible fight, the Squadra Azzurra, which had played its round of 16 two days before that of the Blues against Japan, had lighter legs when it came to concluding. Earvin Ngapeth’s partners no longer had the flame to reverse the situation in the tie-break despite a final last stand in the tie-break (6-13, 12-14).
An arbitration decision at the worst time at the end of the 4th round – which whistles a ball carried to Louati – is also likely to haunt French minds for a long time. “This is an important point at a critical time (instead of returning to 23-22, France is then down 24-21), especially since it’s a gesture that happened several times in the match and the referee hadn’t said anything, regrets Grebennikov, but we should have finished the match before. We had the opportunity to win it before. We should have won it 3-1. We had a lot of break possibilities that we couldn’t convert and we relaunched them. The match was decided on details, and against a team like Italy you pay them cash. “We have opportunities to break three or four points in the fourth (set) and that’s where we lose (the match),” regrets captain Benjamin Toniutti.
For him and this whole generation of French volleyball heroes – Grebennikov, Ngapeth – the last chance to win a World Cup is gone.