“At least he’s not tired,” Didier Deschamps observed sardonically. It was September and Antoine Griezmann was in the latest circle of a recurring nightmare. Back at Atlético Madrid on loan after a gruesome two seasons at Barcelona, Griezmann found himself in the surreal position of being allowed to play only 30 minutes per game, lest an automatic buy clause in his deal be triggered. And so for several weeks, despite being fully fit, Griezmann would watch from the bench, before being wheeled out as a substitute on the hour mark.
Still, you could rely on the France manager to put a positive spin on things. Of all the stalwarts of the Deschamps era, it is Griezmann with whom he seems to have the closest bond of all, an almost paternal connection that has held firm through the toughest of times. Even as Griezmann withered away at Barcelona, even as he languished on the bench in Madrid, even when it seemed as though the peak years of this extraordinary footballer were winnowing away, Deschamps’ faith in his talismanic forward never wavered. Now, in their third World Cup together, we are seeing the results.
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Quietly, it is Griezmann and not Kylian Mbappé who has been France’s most influential player in Qatar. Although unless you have been watching them closely, it may not necessarily be apparent why. Griezmann is yet to score a goal in this tournament. In fact, he has gone 10 games without scoring for his country. Four France players, including midfielder Adrien Rabiot, have taken more shots in this tournament. For a player third on his country’s all-time scoring list, this may appear something of an anomaly.
But Griezmann has been doing a different kind of work here. Stationed in a sort of hybrid position between midfield and attack, Griezmann has made more key passes than any other player in the tournament. Meanwhile, among his teammates only Rabiot has made more blocks; only Aurélien Tchouaméni and Dayot Upamecano have made more ball recoveries. In what many assumed to be the twilight of his career, Griezmann is subtly reinventing the No 10 role, doing the dirty work without sacrificing creative output. Or as Raphaël Varane put it: “He has the ability to get others to play.”
All of which means a player once feted in his prime as a potential challenger to the Messi/Ronaldo axis is quite willingly stepping away from the glory shift, serving the front three of Mbappé, Olivier Giroud and Ousmane Dembélé. “I am not a player who will shoot 50 times a game,” he said before France’s 3-1 win over Poland in the last 16. “I do not worry about the goal. The team needs me in the heart of the game, to be close to my defence when we don’t have the ball.” And in any case, Griezmann has also been a very reluctant sort of superstar.
There was a time when Team Griezmann seemed intent on burnishing his personal brand: adverts, endorsements, a documentary film, the much-ridiculed 2018 live television special The Decision in which he revealed that he was he was staying at Atlético Madrid. But the gladrags of fame never really sat comfortably with a sensitive character largely unmoved by individual milestones, who has never felt the need to grasp the spotlight, who away from the pitch is at his most content playing computer games or tending to his growing stable of racehorses.
This may also explain why his £100m move to Barcelona fell flat: pitched to the club’s fans as a new galáctico, perhaps even a replacement for Messi in time, Griezmann ended up submerging himself in the internal dysfunction at the club, unable to nail down a consistent role under a succession of coaches. And lest we forget, this is a player who learned his trade under Diego Simeone, where the idea that an individual suffers for the team is enshrined in the culture. Griezmann was never meant to be the guy. He was meant to be the guy the guy relies on.
Fittingly, then, it is under Simeone that the first shoots of a revival took shape. “I had a hard time at Barcelona,” Griezmann said this week. “When I came back to Atlético, it was complicated. You had to make yourself small. I tried to find myself a little, on and off the pitch. Now, I’m full of confidence. I feel good at the club and in the national team.”
And now, back in the loving embrace of Deschamps, who has given him 71 international caps in a row, Griezmann has moved into a new phase of his career. In the absence of N’Golo Kanté, France needed a player who could run and hustle, disrupt and win the ball high up the pitch. Deschamps realised that the way to get the best out of a struggling Griezmann was not to take away responsibility, but to give him more. “I owe him everything,” Griezmann said of his coach. “Every action is like a thank you that I send to him.” Against Poland he ran an epic 11.3km. Perhaps, when Deschamps quipped about his lack of game time keeping him fresh, he wasn’t joking.
To Al Khor, then, and a match against England that is already painted in a particular direction. How can England stop Mbappé? Will Kyle Walker be able to handle the pace of Mbappé? Do England have any special plans for Mbappé? How can England restrict the service to Mbappé? Of course, all this suits France just fine. In fact, the most crucial duel on the pitch will be between Griezmann and Declan Rice, the man who will probably be given the job of keeping him quiet. So yes, do keep an eye on Mbappé on Saturday night. But if England get sucked in to a one-man demolition job, they may well be in for a nasty surprise.
