It doesn’t matter who France’s team boss Didier Deschamps will field in today’s international match against Austria – the world champion will play today’s game against Austria (8.45 p.m., ORF eins live) with a star ensemble. The best example: The two star strikers expected for today, Karim Benzema (Real Madrid/30 million euros) and Antoine Griezmann (Atletico Madrid/35 million euros), are likely to have the lowest market value of the team due to their advanced footballer age of over 30 years. Overall, the French are likely to have a market value of almost half a billion euros today. If Kylian Mbappe (160 million) is only a replacement, as expected, Leipzig striker Christopher Nkunku will lead the list with 80 million euros.
Rangnick’s history with Mbappe
ÖFB team boss Ralf Rangnick has a special past in common with France’s star striker Mbappe. “I met him and his parents twice in Paris in the winter of 2015. We were in complete agreement with his parents back then in Leipzig. At that point I couldn’t have predicted that four years later I would be the Leipzig coach myself. ” The background: Leipzig had separated from his coach Alexander Zorniger at the time. There was no long-term perspective at the time, which is why the transfer fell through. Rangnick on the 23-year-old Mbappe: “His development has confirmed what we saw in him back then at the age of 16, 17. If you consider his age and his strengths, he is the measure of all things for the future , if he keeps his feet on the ground.”
To be able to stop the French attack, a perfect performance will be necessary. Rangnick: “With all due respect, France have much more individual quality than Denmark. We also looked very closely at the goals conceded from the Denmark game.”
Via Schalke to the national team
Rangnick had already announced before the four international matches that all players would be used. This also applies to the goalkeeper position. And Martin Fraisl will probably make his team debut today – otherwise Monday at the latest against Denmark. The 29-year-old has a very special past behind him: ten years ago he didn’t play in a top youth academy, but with SV Sierning in the Upper Austrian league against teams like Bad Ischl or Bad Schallerbach. The head protection that he probably wore for every game in the style of Chelsea goalkeeper legend Petr Cech has long been history and is no longer worn.
The development of Fraisl, who grew up in the district of Amstetten near the Upper Austrian border, has been like a fairy tale ever since: He has never seen a junior academy from the inside. Instead, things went uphill step by step after he left Sierning. From the Austrian second division club FAC we went to Botosani in Romania, from there to the German second division club Sandhausen and then to ADO Den Haag in the Netherlands. Last season he switched to FC Schalke 04 as a substitute goalkeeper, took his chance and was number one at the end of the season when they won the championship title in the second division and were promoted to the Bundesliga. Today his career could find another high point with a game against the world champion.
number games
Austria and France have met 23 times in international football matches. With twelve wins, two draws and nine defeats, the balance sheet speaks for the “Equipe Tricolore”, which also won the most recent showdown on October 14, 2009 in the World Cup qualifiers in Saint-Denis 3-1. This was revenge for the “first leg” in which Janko (8th), Aufhauser (41st) and Ivanschitz (73rd/penalty) scored a 3-1 win for the ÖFB on September 6, 2008.
“Games We Love”
Captain David Alaba is looking forward to the Nations League game between the Austrian national football team and France. The duel with the world champion will show how the recent upward trend is, said the 29-year-old Real Madrid professional, who specifically warns of an opponent: his stormy club colleague Karim Benzema. “It’s something special to be able to see how hard and intensively he works every day. He played an outstanding season,” explained Alaba.
“The anticipation is huge. These are teams we want to compete with and games we love to play,” emphasized the red-white-red footballer of the year 2021, who approached the encounter with his colleagues without much respect want to go to the French. “We will analyze them again and then try to find solutions. We will counter it,” Alaba assured.
Source: Nachrichten
