The France team certainly complicated the task on Thursday evening, but it accomplished the essentials in Halle aux Sports Ranko-Zeravica in Belgrade. In a venue far too silent, in front of a few dozen spectators at most, Jean-Aimé Toupane‘s protégés began their qualifying tournament for the 2022 World Cup (September 22 – October 1 in Australia) with a sluggish victory against the Mali (77-66).
The playful songs of the Malians in the minutes which preceded the beginning of the meeting had their small effect. Galvanized, they jostled the Bleues near the basket, caused many stray balls (12 for France at the break, 29 in total!) and thus imposed a false rhythm at the start of the match. The repeated efforts of Iliana Rupert (11 of France’s first 14 points) ended up giving her team a first advantage (14-11), on which the substitutes relied to take the lead after 10 minutes (23- 18).
29
The France team lost 29 balls against Mali, who returned 30 possessions.
While they seemed to quietly fly to the score (33-22, 14th), the daughters of Jean-Aimé Toupane were guilty of defensive largesse which reflected a form of nervousness, the result of a lack of automatisms.
A life-saving long-distance address
Upon returning from the locker room, Marine Johannès (11 points) and hers confirmed the immense difficulties observed, alternating between coherent defensive sequences, and balls returned without being really abused. The gap varied little and a three-point basket at the buzzer in the third quarter of Migna Touré (14 points at 100%) offered some air to France (58-47, 30th).
It is also the long-distance address that allowed the tricolors to hold the rope in this part: an unexpected 14 out of 27 in the exercise (51.9%), which contained the incessant and exemplary opposing combativeness. What counterbalance, too, the lack of automatism in a group perhaps confused by the major absences (Sarah, Miyem and Gruda), recorded during the preparation.
Les Bleues will not really have time to gamble on the many shortcomings observed in this first match: they will face Nigeria on Friday (6 p.m.), largely beaten by China (90-76), with the challenge of compiling their ticket for Australia. In doing so, however, it will be necessary to display another basket.
