It was a claim made at the time and it’s been repeated since but it’s not strictly true that France won their first and only World Cup twenty years ago without a centre-forward. They did after all have Stephane Guivarc’h leading the line for 271 minutes as the hosts temporarily healed a culturally divided country in jubilation and patriotism. The fair-haired poacher had just enjoyed a successful season with Auxerre, winning Ligue 1’s Golden Boot by scoring 21 goals.
Les Bleus also had Christophe Dugarry in their ranks, an occasionally sumptuous striker whose 6ft 2 frame belied stereotype. Dugarry contributed 126 minutes all told, scoring in France’s opener against South Africa and coming on as a sub during the latter stages of an iconic deconstruction of Brazil in the final.
Yet context and comparison here is everything. As prolific as Guivarc’h was when facing the rear-guards of Cannes or Guingamp he was unquestionably a level below his international team-mates. He drew a blank throughout the tournament and later that summer he joined Newcastle United where his entire impact consisted of a singular goal. Years later the Daily Mail deemed him the worst striker in the Premier League era.
Dugarry meanwhile was enduring a thoroughly miserable – and mercifully brief - spell way down in the pecking order at Barcelona. He was soon to move to Marseilles where his strike-rate became ever more sporadic and eventually transferred to Birmingham City where he too scored on just the one occasion on English turf.
Despite these critical evaluations though their game-time is indisputable, as too their honest running throughout, so of course les tricolores triumphed over the global elite with a centre-forward, two in fact. The point of interest lies in France winning despite having them.
Through no fault of their own the duo’s inclusion in the World Cup winning eleven of 1998 made them the weakest link – in the case of Guivarc’h notably so – because this wasn’t simply a vintage French team: this was one of the greatest sides ever created. Ahead of Fabien Barthez the classy colossus Desailly partnered Laurent Blanc, with Thuram and Lizarazu darting down the flanks. Patrolling the midfield was Deschamps and Petit with an emerging Vieira understudying. For creativity take your pick from Zidane, Karembeu, Djorkaeff, Diomede and Pires while making special guest appearances was Thierry Henry and David Trezeguet, the latest prestigious talents rolled out by the famed Clairfontaine national academy.
Spearheading this glittering cast of household names was a decidedly mediocre forward and at other times a front man who was all silk and little substance. Given France’s achievements that summer that is akin to Manchester City winning the league this season, not with Aguero or Jesus up front, but Patrick Bamford and, let’s say, Salomon Rondon.
It confounds all logic and not only the accomplishment (even concentrating on just the final sees France trounce the legendary five-times World Cup winners with the Premier League’s worst ever striker paired against the likes of Roberto Carlos, Aldair and Cafu) but in how utterly unnecessary it was. Kicking their heels on the bench in that famous final was the Monaco pairing of Henry and Trezeguet, both twenty and ready to explode onto the world’s stage. Starting ahead of them was a striker who soon after struggled to find the net in the SPL with Rangers.
The explanation as to why this was can be found in the year. This was before Barcelona and later Spain ripped up the tactical rulebook and deployed false nines thus reducing the role of an out-and-out centre-forward to a rarely used plan B. And it was several years before Henry was reimagined as a goal-machine for Arsenal. He was a winger and that was that in an era where structure trumped individual talent and someone leading the line was a prerequisite. Trezeguet meanwhile was under-used due to a distrust of his youth.
More so, in Aime Jacquet this extravagantly gifted group were coached by a man formerly defensive as a player, taciturn by nature, and so traditional in his ways that the press dubbed him ‘palaeolithic’ a mere twelve months before the tournament began.
All things considered then it is entirely unsurprising that a lesser light shone weakly atop an otherwise glorious monument. It was out of perceived necessity. Through specialising in a role that France was in short supply of despite possessing an abundance of brilliance elsewhere a Championship-standard striker has a World Cup medal while Ronaldo and Messi do not. It was well deserved because he put in the hard yards but it could also be said that Stephane Guivarc’h remains the most fortunate of men.
