Pogba captains France to shock 2-0 home loss to Finland

Pogba captains France to shock 2-0 home loss to Finland

France suffered a shock defeat as they were beaten 2-0 at home by Finland in a friendly.

Marcus Forss put Finland ahead in the 28th minute with debutant Onni Valakari proceeding to make it 2-0 just three minutes later.

France who are ranked second in the world and were captained by Paul Pogba, were unable to stage a comeback against the team ranked 55th.

 

 

World champions France dominated possession and had the first clear chance when debutant Marcus Thuram’s header crashed onto the crossbar, but Didier Deschamps’ side, without the injured Kylian Mbappe, lacked inspiration throughout.

Les Bleus, whose last defeat was in June 2019 when they lost 2-0 away to Turkey in a Euro 2020 qualifier, face Portugal away on Saturday and Sweden at home on Tuesday in League A, Group 3 of the Nations League.

 

 

Forss put the visitors ahead against the run of play, beating keeper Steve Mandanda from close range with Finland’s first attempt of the game in the 28th minute.

Valakari doubled the tally three minutes later with a superb 20 yard curled shot.

Deschamps replaced Olivier Giroud with Anthony Martial in the 57th minute and the hugely disappointing Pogba with N’Golo Kante, while Antoine Greizmann came on for Wissam Ben Yedder, but the changes had little effect.

Finland have now won four of their last five matches.

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