Historic negative record for France

Never so few at Stade de France for Les Bleus

Thursday night will go down in the history of French soccer by the wrong door: not enough was the lack of excitement in the 0-0 draw with Israel in the fifth day of the Nations League, there'è also to be recorded a historical negative record for the France of football, althoughé not directly related to the performance of the Bleus on the field: never soì few, in fact, have attended a match of the transalpine national soccer team at the Stade de France.

According to what has been confirmed by 'L'Equipe', 16,611 fans showed up in the stands, compared to a capacity that reaches 80 thousand units; a figure that, since the stadium built in the Saint Denis district for the 1998 World Cup has existed, è the worst ever (excluding the period of closed doors due to Covid) as far as home national team matches are concerned.

The previous negative record was 36,842 spectators, recorded in the match between France and New Zealand on June 22, 2003, and valid for the Confederation Cup: more than double the number of spectators who showed up 21 years later to watch the Bleus draw against the Israeli national team, a match among other things on which great attention was paid by law enforcement agencies given the delicate situation that, among other things, requires Israel to play its home matches on a neutral field.

Only on one other occasion has a France match had fewer spectators: there were exactly 16,000 who went to Guingamp to see Les Bleus beat the Faroe Islands 5-0, but the Stade de Roudourou can hold just 2,000 more people. A whole other world compared to the Stade de France.