Didier Deschamps<\/a>, France’s longest-serving manager, ended his 14-year stint in charge after the nation’s semi-final exit to Spain at the 2026 World Cup. <\/p>\nZidane, a World Cup winner with France in 1998, has been out of management since leaving Real Madrid for a second time as head coach in 2021. <\/p>\n
The 54-year-old, widely considered to be France’s greatest player, will sign a contract that will see him lead the nation through the 2030 World Cup qualifiers. <\/p>\n
On being appointed, he said it was “a great source of pride” to lead the French national side following their fourth-place finish at the World Cup.<\/p>\n
“I’ve often said it: there’s nothing greater than the French national team. So it’s a joy and obviously a great source of pride to become the manager of this French national team,” he added.<\/p>\n
“It’s also a responsibility. I want to thank [French Football Federation] president Philippe Diallo, the executive committee, and the French Football Federation for their confidence and acknowledge the 14 years of service from Didier and his staff. <\/p>\n
“I also have a special thought today for all my coaches. Needless to say, I have high ambitions for the French national team.”<\/p>\n
Diallo described the new head coach as a “legend” of French football.<\/p>\n
“The appointment of Zinedine Zidane as head coach of the French national team is a source of immense pride for the French Football Federation,” he said.<\/p>\n
“It marks the meeting of a legend in the history of Les Bleus, who has become one of the most decorated and respected coaches of his generation, and a team with rare potential, driven by the highest ambitions.”<\/p>\n
Zidane’s predecessor Deschamps guided France to three major finals over his 14-year reign, helping the country to their second World Cup success with victory in 2018.<\/p>\n
Zidane’s first competitive fixture in charge will be a Nations League trip to Turkey on 25 September.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Real Madrid manager Zinedine Zidane has been confirmed as the head coach of the France national team.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":789154,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[69],"tags":[403,99],"class_list":["post-789153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/789153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=789153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/789153\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/789154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=789153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=789153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=789153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}