Marcus Thuram during his presentation in Mönchengladbach.

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LEON KUEGELER / AFP

  • Didier Deschamps announced Thursday the expanded list of 26 players to face Finland, Portugal and Sweden on Wednesday.

  • The only novelty is the presence of Marcus Thuram, who is a hit in the Bundesliga near Mönchengladbach.

A month exactly after the last French rally, Didier Deschamps will be back with his troops for a new block of three games, and it starts on Wednesday with a friendly against Finland at the Stade de France.

It will then be time to head to Portugal for the crucial Group A match in the League of Nations, before returning to the country to face Sweden.

Three matches in six days, no time to fool around in a marathon season to make you regret the confinement of April.

This is also why Deschamps, unlike what he had done the last time by taking only one player more than the 23 usually authorized, chose to really expand his list by calling 26 men.

And if there is never an innocuous list, that of Thursday was still of some importance since there will be only one gathering left in March before Euro 2020-2021.

So it was better to be this time around.

Even if Deschamps, as a good human resources director that he is, hinted that the door was not yet closed for the November failures.

26 players called up by Didier Deschamps for the 3 November matches with a first call-up for Marcus Thuram!

🙌 #FiersdetreBleus pic.twitter.com/1deg87NL88

- French team ⭐⭐ (@equipedefrance) November 5, 2020

A list expanded to 26 players

The list, let's get to it.

We weren't expecting any big surprises on Thursday and there wasn't one except one, but we'll come back to that.

We could possibly discuss the absence of the Sevillian Jules Koundé to whom Deschamps preferred Kurt Zouma, holder with Chelsea this season, or the choice to take Sissoko instead of a Tanguy Ndombélé who seems to have finally launched his adventure among the Spurs, but basically all the called deserve to be there.

We could also have wondered about the presence of a Kylian Mbappé yet spared by PSG and probably forfeited this weekend for the coming of Rennes to the Parc des Princes, but this will be the subject of a future article.

No, the only (real) novelty is the first in Blue for former Guingampais Marcus Thuram, preferred to his club teammate Alassane Pléa.

The two men were a hit at Mönchengladbach, but there was only one place to take and the less axial and more versatile profile of the “son of” tipped the scales in his direction.

Numbers 9 in my team, "I've had enough for my taste" explained the coach.

“Thuram can play on one side”, Marcus advantage.

Thuram rather than Pléa, considered too axial by Deschamps

For the profile, let's turn it over to DD: “Marcus, I've been following him for a while, he's interesting.

He was already doing good things at Guingamp but there he moved to a higher level with his club.

He has great percussion and power capacities, he scores and makes score.

"And then he is always present in the big games", continued Deschamps, referring in particular to his double in the Champions League against Real last week.

Now is the right time to see it.

"Whether he is the son of" Tutu ", says La Dèche," it goes second or third.

The merit is Marcus who has it.

"

Difficult to prove the French coach wrong.

Landed in the Bundesliga in the summer of 2019, the striker with an imposing physique and respectable technique, did not need any adaptation time, which says a lot about his character and the confidence that has guided him since his debut in young people in Sochaux.

From his first match at Gladbach, Thuram planted and, if he is still far from the stats of a Lewandowski with Bayern, the Frenchman has a reasonable record of 17 goals in 40 games played.

So far, the boy has climbed the steps without showing the slightest weakness.

If he repeats this in the France team, Thuram will clearly have a good card to play for the Euro.

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