Display MoreA fair point. Now let me explain why I disagree with some things mentioned.
1. Well, in 2014 France finally "woke up" after several hibernation years. Of course, they have always managed to find decent players with great technique, but it hasn't always worked well for them. Since the silver medals at the 2009 ECH and until the 4th place at the 2014 WCH the French team had been, more or less, idle.
2. I agree about the qualities of Grebennikov, Toniutti, Le Roux, and even Le Goff. However, Ngapeth and Rouzier remain somewhat risky and depend a lot on a good day match routine. They have been surprisingly consistent in the NT for, maybe, 2 years in a row now, which is an impressive, lone fact. I can't predict how long it will continue. However, I also tend to disagree Ngapeth is a leader of this team. To me, they have no obvious leader, but rather a group of players sacrificing themselves for the team's goal. Last about individual skills, Tillie is a great receiver and a reliable player overall, but he can't do everything. I mean, usually his role is a bit restricted and can rarely carry the whole team forward (which, of course, he hasn't felt the need to do yet).
3. 2025 is a bit far away in the future
Having said that, I want to state France have never really been undersetimated here. They remind me of Bulgaria a lot, only in terms of history and performance, of course, not of style, which means they show up with good stuff occasionally. I wrote it last night already, I feel different about them now, this game they are displaying belongs to the world's elite, no question about that. But they weren't always mentioned among the favourites for any title just because we were never sure if they will shine brightly just then. I seriously doubt any coach, player, or fan was ever OK and would gladly accept to play against France, not in the last 15 years, surely not now. But even this group of players around Laurent Tillie needs to win some medals, just like Konstantinov-Kaziyski's Bulgaria and Antiga-Kieffer-Granvorka's France did. It's pretty much the same with the Iranian team, we've had the discussion earlier.
But to sum up, yes, I even think 2014 was the time when France officially stepped inside the world's elite. We all know how thin the ice over there on the top is
In 2014 France woke up as you said, but until now I was not sure that it wasn't a flash in the pan, because all along its history, France usually makes a great tournament each 4,5 years and in the meantime it comes back in mediocrity. The reason why France has been very incosistent and discontinuous it was because France always had great players (Antiga, Granoworka, Fabiani) among very poor players (on the contrary Bulgaria had always great line-ups in my opinion with 6,7 great players, and with some up and downs has always been among the top teams of volleyball, since the time of Zlatanov father and even before, France no).
Now France has 7 very good players, that's why it can stay among the elite of volleyball, until 2025 because (as I said before) they are all young