Sacré Bleu: From Zidane to Mbappé – A football journey: From Zidane to Mbappe - A football journey - Softcover

Matthew Spiro

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1785906607 ISBN 13: 9781785906602

Publisher: Biteback Publishing, 2021

Synopsis

Remember when Zinédine Zidane lifted the World Cup in 1998? Kylian Mbappé doesn't. The forward wasn't born when the French team first became world champions. But it was Mbappé's unique talent that helped France reach the summit of world football once again in 2018, erasing years of failure, rancour and shame.

For Les Bleus, the road between these two highs was blighted by bitterly painful lows. Zidane's headbutt; a players' strike; infighting and recriminations; even sex scandals and blackmail. Mbappé witnessed it all as he honed his prodigious talent in the banlieues of Paris, and his story embodies France's journey from disaster to triumph.

In Sacré Bleu, Matthew Spiro traces the rise, fall and rise again of Les Bleus through the lens of Kylian Mbappé. Featuring a foreword by Arsène Wenger and interviews with leading figures in French football, Spiro asks what went wrong for France and what, ultimately, went right.

About this title

About the Author

Matthew Spiro is a French football expert who has covered Les Bleus at major tournaments for the past two decades. A British journalist and broadcaster, he moved to Paris in 2002, collaborating with the BBC, UEFA.com, the Irish Times, The Times, the Daily Telegraph, IMG and Canal+. Matthew has been in charge of Ligue 1 s global television coverage at BeIN Sports since 2012. He is the Ligue 1 world feed s lead commentator and presents the Ligue 1 Show, which is broadcast in more than 150 countries, including by BT Sport in the UK.

Edition details

• Publisher: Biteback Publishing
• Publication date: 2021
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1785906607
• ISBN 13: 9781785906602
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 368