Cabaye/ Ben Arfa

Do you think they will both start on Mon? Or maybe just Dreamboat. Wish England could get away with Ben Arfa on the bench...

Provisional Lineups: http://blog.oddslife.com/2012/06/ho...o-plays-hodgsons-five-point-plan-for-success/

 

Ben Arfa will play a part, I personally see him coming on as a sub and unlocking us in the last 20 mins or so.

 

Two hat tricks.

 

France's midfield will be:

------M'Vila--Cabaye------
Menez-----Nasri-----Ribery
---------Benzema--------

 

I came.

 

I prefer neither play but hopefully they have stinkers if they do. I hope France go home early just for our sake but I will find myself willing both to do well once our game with them is out of the way.

 

Especially when you think they have HBA, Martin, Matuidi, Giroud, Valbuena etc.

And a defence of:

------------Lloris------------
Debuchy--Rami--Mexes--Clichy

If they can get themselves sorted out they have a cracking team.

 

Can't help but want to see Cabaye and Ben Arfa have good games, even if it does come at England's expense.

 

In my considered opinion, Mexes is pants

 

In which case Koscielny starts

 

Sakho.

 

I'm not that impressed with France. On paper they look immense but they lack that bit of experience you need sometimes. They had it in their good times with Vieira, Petit, Blanc, Henry etc. They just lack something when I've watched and just scraped in. I do rate Blanc though and think he might derive the required grit from them to go with their undoubted talent

 

This.

 

The cynical side of me wants them to play well just to protect our investments - at the end of the day they could be bought this summer regardless, its hardly a gamble given their clear natural ability and ability to play well in the Premiership (and in the bigger games of the Premiership) even if they have a terrible tournament (if that would put the big teams off players then they'd have no England players).

At least if they have class tournaments it will inflate their prices and if they stay, they'll be brimming with confidence which can only be a good thing. I know I'd rather have 55m and no Ben Arfa or Cabaye than 25m and neither!

 

Hopefully in August we'll have £0m for them and still have them both

 

Amen!

 

Another way of looking at it is that if our players have an outstanding tournament, and they are still our players after it, how good will this look to potential targets when it comes down to choosing which club they want to join? I'm hoping that they both have a stunning tournament and that it raises our profile across Europe and the world

 

This

 

Defo. I just think if they have a poor tournament there is more chance of that being the case. Plus from a purely biased perspective, they could do with a break, moreso Cabaye. All round for me France making a group stage exit is the best scenario. Better for England which is the priority this summer, and better fir Newcastle in view of next season. Both excite for next year, particularly Cabaye. Players like him usually take a massive leap forward 2nd season in England. Given he did pretty well in his first, the sky is the limit.