{"id":831352,"date":"2026-07-28T12:30:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T12:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/831352\/"},"modified":"2026-07-28T12:30:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T12:30:09","slug":"zinedine-zidane-named-as-france-head-coach-following-world-cup-2026-football-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/831352\/","title":{"rendered":"Zinedine Zidane named as France head coach following World Cup 2026 | Football News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"article__subhead\">Ex-superstar player succeeds Didier Deschamps as France manager after the national team\u2019s bitter semifinal exit in the United States.<\/p>\n<p>Published On 28 Jul 202628 Jul 2026<\/p>\n<p class=\"tr-story-p1\">France great Zinedine Zidane\u2019s long-held ambition to coach the national team became reality on Tuesday when the French Football Federation appointed the former captain and World Cup winner as Didier Deschamps\u2019 successor on a four-year contract.<\/p>\n<p class=\"tr-story-p1\">The \u2060appointment of former Real Madrid manager Zidane comes two weeks after Deschamps\u2019 tenure as coach ended following France\u2019s fourth-place finish at the World Cup. His final match in charge was a 6-4 defeat by England.<\/p>\n<p>Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe French team was the only thing I wanted to do,\u201d Zidane told reporters.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ve always looked at this \u2060team through the eyes of a future manager. I didn\u2019t take a club job for that reason. The only thing I wanted to do after Madrid was manage the French national team.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI could have taken on a three-year role because Deschamps was there. He made that decision in January 2025, and the very next day I knew I wanted to be the next one. We met with the president and the deal was sealed,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Zidane, 54, is expected to begin his reign with an away UEFA Nations League game against Turkiye before France host Italy at the Stade de France on October 2.<\/p>\n<p>Deschamps, who left after 14 years at the helm, oversaw 185 matches and 120 victories, guiding France to the 2018 World Cup title, the 2020-21 Nations League trophy and the Euro 2016 and 2022 World Cup finals.<\/p>\n<p>Both share a long association, having been teammates in the 1998 World Cup-winning side at \u00a0home in France.<\/p>\n<p>Zidane played a pivotal role in that triumph and won the Ballon d\u2019Or that year.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-arc-image-770 wp-image-4810823\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/2026-07-28T090557Z_1782289140_RC2XMMAZRSEC_RTRMADP_3_SOCCER-FRANCE-1785230671.jpg\" alt=\"Capped 108 times, Zidane won the 1998 FIFA World Cup and scored 31 goals for France\" fetchpriority=\"low\"\/>Capped 108 times, Zidane won the 1998 FIFA World Cup and scored 31 goals for France [File: John Sibley\/Action Images via Reuters]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ex-superstar player succeeds Didier Deschamps as France manager after the national team\u2019s bitter semifinal exit in the United&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":831353,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[49,48,3456,527,637,44,457,82,13010],"class_list":["post-831352","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-europe","tag-football","tag-france","tag-news","tag-sport","tag-sports","tag-world-cup-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/831352","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=831352"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/831352\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/831353"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=831352"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=831352"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=831352"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}