STILL RAGIN A MONTH ON: anti France n Pro Croatia

World Cup's over then, but still the feeling nags away at me that France were unworthy winners of the thing. Of course they played well, fast efficient football and easily had the strongest team and probably the strongest squad. Mbappe too was the tournament's real star, eclipsing not only Neymar but Ronaldo and Messi too. Driving at teams with Griezmann ontop of an iron base of Matuidi and Kante, he ripped teams apart practically on his own. France swept aside every team that faced them without much difficulty. The final was the biggest disappointment: never in a million years is that a freekick for 1-0, and never in a million years is that a penalty for 2-1. Croatia were robbed, absolutely robbed of their best spell of the game. After that, Modric, Rakitic and crucially the goalkeeper Subosic were out of gas, unable to chase any longer after such an exhausting set of fixtures.

I saw plenty of calls for a France win before the game, citing the recent fascism of Croatia fans as a main reason for doing so. But fuck Croatia for a second. France. France, France. France winning the World Cup was a footballing disappointment and a disappointment in the most general, social and humane sense possible.

This France team could well go onto dominate international football just as Real Madrid have dominated club football over the past 5 years. I honestly would not be surprised if France won the next Euros and the Qatar World Cup too. They have a young, skilfull, dynamic set of players. Pogba and Mbappe should go on to dominate the Ballon d'Or as Ronaldo and Messi edge to retirement. And if Deschamps stays, then again, just like Real Madrid, they will turn into a winner whom no one really loves.

For a World Cup that was for once so engaging even in its calmer moments, of an actually exciting group stage, Germany going out pre-knockouts for the first time ever and England even reaching the semis, a World Cup that early on at least, was boiling with the sense of the normal way of things being snatched from infront of our eyes - for this there could be no less worthy winner than France. This France was the most functional, rational, fucking Cartesian team imaginable. This was a team that on basis of imagination, of daring to do something brave and worthy of the word magic on a football pitch, should have been emphatically defeated by Peru, Argentina, Belgium and Croatia. Instead all we got was Mbappe burning people out over 60-yard sprints, aimless long balls, generous refereeing and the occasional world class pass from Pogba on the break. I know I'm being dramatic, unfair, well over the top, but there's a reason Mark Fisher likened the World Cup to Kubrick's Overlook Hotel - the place where people come and go and the wallpaint and furniture are resplashed and rebuilt but really, nothing ever actually changes. Because since 1958, there have only even been four new winners of the World Cup and despite what scintillating football some of the minnows arrive with in the group stages (ie. Mexico 2018 or Chile 2014), the same old mechanics eventually take hold. Experience, know-how, fitness, reserves, backing, confidence - those painfully bureaucratic terms that could just as easily describe why people who go to private school usually do way better than those who do not, will always rise up towards the end of a World Cup, and any promise of the glass being shattered is snuffed out by a team that, in old adage, simply knows how to win. I can't remember a team that epitomised these concepts more than France. Sitting deep off the ball, waiting for the other team to make a mistake, hoping that team doesn't have a player capable of doing something magical for too long. Individually the France team is absolutely stuffed with flair and creativity. This is a team that is crying out to flow forward and rip teams apart with ease. Pogba, Griezmann, Lemar, Nzonzi, Fekir, Dembele and of course Mbappe - these are some of the most capable passers and movers in Europe, players most other countries would absolutely cry and die to have in their starting elevens. To see them shackled into such boring, defensive displays was a pure footballing tragedy at a tournament where the world takes notice, sits back and expects to be inspired by the very best. The reason I supported Croatia in the final was mainly because of Modric. On his own, Modric dragged Croatia to the final and his semi-final display versus England is one of the best World Cup performances I have ever seen. Croatia were down one-nil at the break but Modric returned for the second half like a captain who'd just remembered he was travelling on his own ship. Calling for the ball, gliding away from men on the quarter turn, flicking it around corners no one else could even see, pulling his teammates into position and shapes like pieces on a chessboard - the kind of creativity, allied to a sense of the wider aim, allied to a sense of the collective of a team that is simply poetry in motion and so enchanting to watch. France has more than one player able to do this kind of thing but Deschamps was having none of it, and instead chained his creative men back into conservative shapes even during the group stage games.

Will there ever be a World Cup with a proper upset? If not I'd rather a team that captures the world's imagination like Spain did in 2010, or even a single player (Modric, Messi, Ronaldo, Maradona, Cruyff) to lead a team to victory on his own, a player who with sheer vision is able to do things no one thought possible, to beat teams no one thought beatable. Football is so, so much more than a technocracy - it's a place where the imagination not only lives but thrives, where bloody-mindedness and wispy little dreams can somehow take ahold and confound rationale, expectations, formbooks, even the most basic commonsense. There are countless examples of this in the club game, but we're still waiting for a World Cup that really swings this way, and Deschamp's France are only the latest example of its stubborn refusal to do so.