International: The media criticize M’Vila

After an average performance this Wednesday at the Stade de France, Yann M’Vila didn’t escape criticism from the media after the game. After heaping lots of praise on the young midfielder since August, they clearly designed him, this time, as the French player who disappointed expectations against Brazil, while giving him the benefit of circumstances.

As soon as he was replaced on the pitch by Abou Diaby, TF1’s “pitch-side” man Frédéric Calenge spilled the first blood by noting that M’Vila had lost an “innumerable” and “unusual” quantity of balls at midfield during his hour on the pitch. An assessment later moderated by So Foot’s website, which counted «ten lost balls out of forty-four ” played, reminding such a statistic wasn’t “dramatic”.
WebsiteFootball365.fr recognized that M’Vila had managed “some successful anticipations” and availability, eventually resulting in a “nice performance” despite “a bit of waste”. Same opinion in Eurosport.fr, which appreciated the Rennais’ will to “play forwards”.

Commentaries were much more severe on website Sports.fr. According to them, M’Vila had simply been “out of pace, unable to hold the ball or to carry the ball cleanly as he had taken the habit to do with France”.
An opinion rather shared this morning by Le Parisien-Aujourd’hui en France, who qualified his game as “disappointing”, while underlining that the young midfielder played at a position higher than the one he usually occupies in Rennes. For causing “too much waste and missing too many passes forward”, he received one of the less good marks given by the newspaper, equal to Florent Malouda but above Yoann Gourcuff.

Finally, L’Équipe mentions the difficulty that M’Vila seemed to have in switching from Rennes’ 4-3-3 to Laurent Blanc’s 4-2-3-1. “The Rennais seemed lost, the newspaper stated. We could see him hesitant, lacking firmness in his choices and in his positioning”.
Afther the game, the player himself recognized he hadn’t been as good as usual. “I didn’t feel as much at ease as usual, clearly, but I don’t know why, M’Vila explained. The field didn’t really help to play fine football. And against us, there was a very good team, with very, very good players”.