Dembélé benched? His performance against Senegal reignites the debate

Ousmane Dembélé delivered another disappointing performance in a France shirt during the team’s opening World Cup match against Senegal, to the point that his place in the starting lineup for the next match against Iraq is now openly being questioned.

While he has established himself as one of the world’s best players at PSG — to the point of winning the Ballon d’Or last season — the Paris striker struggles to reproduce that level with the Blues. Deployed as a central playmaker behind Kylian Mbappé, he was invisible, just as he had been during the warm-up match against Northern Ireland eight days earlier. Didier Deschamps eventually moved him to the right wing during the match, entrusting the central role to Michael Olise.

The change immediately benefited the Bayern player: Olise delivered a brilliant assist for Mbappé’s opening goal, influenced every attacking move and was rightfully named man of the match, despite the Madrid captain’s brace.

“For me, Dembélé is the big loser of this match, that’s undeniable,” said pundit Walid Acherchour. He can easily imagine him on the bench against Iraq: “It’s plausible. Or otherwise he’ll have to play on the right, like in the second half, but even on the right I didn’t find him extraordinary. When you look at Olise’s performance, when you see Mbappé’s last half hour… he’s on the margins of this duo.”

Acherchour continued by highlighting the striking contrast between PSG’s Dembélé and the one in a France shirt: “We saw a France team with Dembélé in the number 10 position and one with Olise. And we saw the difference on the scoreboard. This isn’t the Ousmane Dembélé we know at PSG, there’s erratic technique. It’s not his team, it’s not his home. He has the guest room, not the master bedroom in this France team. He’s not comfortable, he doesn’t have his bearings.”

The question of whether to start Dembélé against Iraq is shaping up to be one of the main talking points of the week for Didier Deschamps, who will have to choose between loyalty to his attacker and continuing with a system that clearly worked much better with Olise in the center.