Coach Jacquet shows no love of flair with Cantona and Ginola
SCOTTISH football writers are known as 'fans with typewriters' for reasons which become ear-splittingly apparent when the national team scores a goal.
Fellow scribes often have a problem with the Scots reporters' passion for players wearing the dark blue with the thistle emblem over their hearts.
On many an occasion the journalists have been asked by their colleagues to refrain from being so raucous in support of their side or vacate the press box.
At the opposite end of the spectrum you have the French press corps who rarely show any emotion when recording the fortunes of their football side.
On one memorable occasion in Mexico during the 1986 World Cup, a Hong Kong-based reporter became so incensed at their poker-faced posturing that he used his best franglais to tell them that they were all jerks.
He could not believe that while the masterly midfield trio of Michael Platini, Jean Tigana and Alain Giresse were weaving their magic the scribes were thumping their keys with seeming indifference.
Given that background, it's reasonable to assume that the French press is not spearheading a campaign to have those wonderfully wacky footballing geniuses, Eric Cantona and David Ginola, included in the squad for the European Championship finals in England this summer.
Incredibly, to anyone born without the smell of garlic in their mouths, the duo have been omitted from the party for a friendly with Portugal this week and look in danger of missing the finals.
It seems that France's coach Aime Jacquet does not aime the two English-based players that much and could well stick with the team that won qualification.
Jacquet, it has to be explained, has a pretty ropey football pedigree and heads the national team by default rather than anything else.
He reckons that his defence-minded side - he plays four at the back and three ball-winners in midfield - can continue their two-year run of avoiding defeat.
During that time, he points out with pride, they have conceded just two goals in 10 qualifying matches.
Oh, how sad, to be talking about not letting in goals and a rock solid defence when your country possesses two of the most talented players in the world today. So why is Jacquet prepared to leave them in the wilderness? Well he, and a great many French football fans, don't believe they have the passion to play for their country.
They point to the temperamental duo's past outbursts - Cantona slagging off the coach and Ginola going in the huff when left on the substitutes' bench.
What they appear to be forgetting is that both are playing the best football of their careers in England (the venue for the finals) and both have been admirable 'team men'.
Cantona has kept his boots, words and gestures very much to himself since his return from his eight-month ban for kung-fu fighting and Ginola has been exceptional in Newcastle's surge to the top of the Premier League.
If they are left out and goalkeeper Jean-Jacques Bertrand, currently serving a two-month ban for smoking cannabis, is included, the French will be exposed as real dopes.
