{"id":1497625,"date":"2026-09-28T22:29:34","date_gmt":"2026-09-28T21:29:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.squawka.com\/en\/?post_type=features&#038;p=1497625"},"modified":"2026-09-28T22:29:36","modified_gmt":"2026-09-28T21:29:36","slug":"post-match-analysis-belgium-vs-france-28-09-26","status":"publish","type":"features","link":"https:\/\/www.squawka.com\/en\/features\/post-match-analysis-belgium-vs-france-28-09-26\/","title":{"rendered":"Belgium vs France stats and analysis: Les Bleus&#8217; big guns hand Red Devils taste of their own medicine"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>France defeated Belgium 1-0 in Brussels to extend their unbeaten start in the Uefa Nations League.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It was a tale of two halves as Les Bleus ran out winners thanks to a late Michael Olise goal. Zinedine Zidane named a rather alternative starting XI, featuring eight changes compared to the team that beat Turkey last Friday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Meanwhile Mark van Bommel went with mostly the same men that defeated Italy. The only players that didn&#8217;t start both games were Brighton and Hove Albion&#8217;s Maxim De Cuyper and Rangers&#8217; Nico Raskin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Despite a weakened side in theory, France&#8217;s &#8216;B team&#8217; showed a much stronger performance than the usual starters did against Turkey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-yoast-seo-table-of-contents yoast-table-of-contents\"><h2>How did France beat Belgium?<\/h2><ul><li><a href=\"#h-electric-first-half\" data-level=\"3\">Electric first half<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"#h-french-dominance-in-the-second-half\" data-level=\"3\">French dominance in the second half<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h3 id=\"h-electric-first-half\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">Electric first half<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Both sides looked to press high up the pitch in man-oriented fashion. France went full man-to-man across the whole pitch while Belgium had a block of players pinned back by the French forwards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This was an importand dynamic in how the first half played out. The Red Devils charged forward to press Les Bleus but often in uncoordinated fashion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Apart from the very first play of the game, in which goalkeeper Mike Maignan gifted Belgium the ball just outside his own box, France managed to break Belgium&#8217;s first line of defence quite easily.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The hosts alternated between 4-4-2, 4-4-1-1 and 4-5-1 out of possession &#8211; always depending on Kevin De Bruyne&#8217;s movements. But the former Man City midfielder looked lost whenever he went forward and allowed a lot of space in behind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But all of this actually made for a very entertaining first 45 minutes. Both teams, in their own ways, managed to break through and reach the attacking third with pace and speed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Belgium varied their actions across all three thirds (left, centre and right), but had their most dangerous chances attacking down the right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">One finished in a De Bruyne attempt that went high and wide and the other didn&#8217;t even have a shot. It was actually the first of only two times in which the Red Devils actually manipulated Les Bleus&#8217; man-marking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Both De Bruyne and Diego Moreira made curved runs to turn their man around and have an advantage going forward. Nathan Ngoy spotted them and played an over-the-top through ball. Moreira poked it forward to KDB, who cut it back to Charles De Ketelaere who simply missed the ball. A clear-cut goalscoring opportunity that never was &#8211; statistically, at least.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Meanwhile France actually forced their plays down the right. Desire Doue felt like an absolute cheat code, being able to take defenders on and break the Belgian defensive structure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The PSG winger ended up leading all players on the pitch in shot attempts (5), successful take-ons (5) and chances created (4). He also hit the post once and could have left Brussels with two wonder goals from solo runs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<h3 id=\"h-french-dominance-in-the-second-half\" class=\"wp-block-heading\">French dominance in the second half<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The first and second halves had almost identical numbers in terms of possession. France spent 64% of the time with the ball before half-time and 65% after the break. But there was a huge difference in terms of approach from both sides.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Mark van Bommel looked to instruct his players to sit deeper in the second half. Les Bleus burnt their press over and over in the first half and manufactured artificial transitions for fun. So Belgium took a step back in this regard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As a result, France had as much as 75% possession by the 70th minute. Zidane didn&#8217;t look too comfortable to expose his defensive system even more than their full man-oriented approach already did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Full-backs Pierre Kalulu and Andy Diouf rarely went to the byline, for instance. The manager eventually let his players loose a little more as the second half went on, though. At one point, we saw Doue join Bradley Barcola in the left flank, breaking their structure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Then, we did see both full-backs making overlapping runs &#8211; just not at the same time. If one of them entered the final third, the other took a step back in the opposite side to prevent Belgian counter-attacks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But those ended up coming anyway. The Red Devils had arguably the most imposing five-to-ten-minute stretch of the game, from the 70th to the 80th minute. For perspective, six of their 12 shots of the whole match came from the 73rd minute onwards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">France had done enough to deserve a win, hitting the post twice, breaking Belgium&#8217;s press, reaching the final third with ease and not allowing too many opportunities at the back. But they won the game during their worst stretch of the game &#8211; a testament to their greatness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Not too long before that, Dodi Lukebakio found himself one-on-one with Maignan, but couldn&#8217;t score. The Benfica forward then had another promising opportunity, but decided to take the shot himself and Maignan saved again. Youri Tielemans started both of those fast breaks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Zidane then introduced a few starters during the second half. Ousmane Dembele was the first one &#8211; and probably the worst performing one as well. But Rayan Cherki and Michael Olise were crucial to the goal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Belgium had all 10 outfield players in the attacking half looking to push France back. With multiple headers coming back and forth from both sides, Cherki managed to find Olise on the right-hand side, still in their own half, to get out of danger and settle things down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It ended up kick-starting a one-man fast break, in which Olise left De Cuyper on the ground and slotted it past Senne Lammens with finesse and elegance. They had spent almost the entire second half dominating possession and forcing Belgium back only to win the very way Belgium were trying to hurt them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Both Cherki and Olise had entered the pitch 10 minutes prior to that, but didn&#8217;t need much time to rescue France from a Belgium barrage and win the game.<\/p>\n\n\n<h3><strong>Read more:<\/strong><\/h3>\r\n<ul>\r\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.squawka.com\/en\/news\/\"><strong>Latest football news<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\r\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.squawka.com\/en\/bet\/football-tips\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Football betting tips<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\r\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.squawka.com\/en\/bet\/betting-sites\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Best betting sites<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\r\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.squawka.com\/en\/bet\/betting-sites\/best-free-bet-offers\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Best free bet offers<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\r\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.squawka.com\/en\/bet\/football-tips\/accumulator\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Football accumulator tips<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>France defeated Belgium 1-0 in Brussels to extend their unbeaten start in the Uefa Nations League. It was a tale of two halves as Les Bleus ran out winners thanks to a late Michael Olise goal. Zinedine Zidane named a rather alternative starting XI, featuring eight changes compared to the team that beat Turkey last&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3354,"featured_media":1497627,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_focuskw":"Belgium France","_yoast_wpseo_title":"","_yoast_wpseo_metadesc":"France defeated Belgium 1-0 to extend their unbeaten start in the Uefa Nations League. Read to know how they did it.","footnotes":""},"tags":[],"features-category":[],"squawka-category":[],"class_list":["post-1497625","features","type-features","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":{"external_featured_image_url":"","hide_featured_image_pattern":false},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v28.0 (Yoast SEO v28.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Belgium vs France stats and analysis: Les Bleus&#039; big guns hand Red Devils taste of their own medicine | Squawka | EN<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"France defeated Belgium 1-0 to extend their unbeaten start in the Uefa Nations League. 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