Ivory Coast defeats France 2-1 in friendly ahead of the 2026 World Cup, as Manchester United\u2019s Amad Diallo seals win.<\/p>\n
Published On 4 Jun 20264 Jun 2026<\/p>\n
France has brushed aside \u200cconcerns over their World Cup readiness after suffering a surprise 2-1 defeat by Ivory Coast in a \u2060tournament warm-up match, insisting the setback will serve as a useful reminder rather than a cause for alarm.<\/p>\n
Didier Deschamps\u2019s side \u2060led through a superb first-half goal from Rayan Cherki on Thursday, but they were overrun after the break as Guela Doue and Amad Diallo turned the game around for the \u2060Elephants in Nantes.<\/p>\n
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With France opening their World Cup campaign against Senegal in New York on June 16, midfielder Aurelien Tchouameni said the result should be viewed in the context of preparations.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a pity to lose, but we\u2019re in a \u200cpreparation phase; we stay confident,\u201d Tchouameni said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no conclusion to draw from this game, even if we had won it. We will be ready.\u201d<\/p>\n
France fielded an experimental side, with several Paris Saint-Germain players rested after last weekend\u2019s Champions League final triumph, and made numerous changes after halftime.<\/p>\n
Defender Lucas Hernandez also played down the significance of the defeat.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe always want to win, but we\u2019re in \u2060a phase of preparation, and there were a lot of \u2060substitutions,\u201d Hernandez said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re in good spirits.\u201d<\/p>\n
Deschamps, however, admitted that his side had lost control of the contest after an encouraging opening 45 minutes and warned that France would face opponents with similar qualities to Ivory Coast in the \u2060United States.<\/p>\n
\u201cA defeat is never pleasant, even if we did some good things in the first half,\u201d Deschamps said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the second \u2060half we made a lot of changes, but that\u2019s \u2060no excuse. We were not as good after the break, and they brought a lot of pace.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will face the same type of team on June 16.\u201d<\/p>\n
The France coach said the result could prove useful \u200cif it prevented his players from becoming complacent before the tournament.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a reminder, if we needed one, not to think we\u2019re better than we are,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u200cCherki \u200cadded: \u201cIt\u2019s a little warning, and I can tell you we\u2019re not going to the World Cup thinking we\u2019re favourites, but we\u2019re going to crush everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ivory Coast defeats France 2-1 in friendly ahead of the 2026 World Cup, as Manchester United\u2019s Amad Diallo…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":716365,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[5684,49,48,3456,527,637,114428,44,561,457,82,772,1690,13010],"class_list":["post-716364","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-africa","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-europe","tag-football","tag-france","tag-ivory-coast","tag-news","tag-soccer","tag-sport","tag-sports","tag-united-states","tag-us-canada","tag-world-cup-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=716364"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716364\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/716365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=716364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=716364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=716364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}