The 2022 World Cup final is here, and on Sunday, the defending champions France will take on Argentina. This contest is billed as a matchup between Paris Saint-Germain teammates and two of the best players in the world, Kylian Mbappe and Lionel Messi. However, if the France-Argentina match ends with Mbappe’s side lifting the trophy, it will be just as much because of the France X-factor, Olivier Giroud, as it is because of Mbappe.
Olivier Giroud is the France X-factor in the World Cup final vs. Argentina
On Sunday, the France National Team will try to do something that no country has done at the World Cup since Brazil in 1962. That’s the last time a nation repeated as World Cup champs.
In that final, Brazil’s superstar, Pele, was out injured, and players like Zito, Vava, and Amarildo had to step up and score the goals for Brazil to win 3-1 over Czechoslovakia. In the 2022 World Cup, Kylian Mbappe will be on the pitch, but after taking a tough challenge from a Morocco defender in the semifinal, he may not be at 100% with a lower leg knock.
That means it will be up to someone else on the team to step up in the France-Argentina match if the defending champs hope to repeat. And on Sunday, that player — that X-factor — will be French striker Olivier Giroud.
Giroud played in his first World Cup in 2014, appearing in all five games, starting two, and scoring one goal. In 2018, the longtime Chelsea and Arsenal striker played in all seven France matches and started all but one. However, Giroud didn’t just fail to score a goal in that tournament. He didn’t put one of his 13 shots on target.
While that sounds bad (and the media had a field day with it), Giroud’s 2018 performance is actually underrated. The veteran hitman made thankless runs and occupied center-backs’ attention while the in-his-prime star Antoine Griezmann and a 19-year-old teenager named Kylian Mbappe scored four goals apiece.
France would not have won the 2018 World Cup final without Olivier Giroud.
Fast forward to the 2022 World Cup, and defenses are much more worried about Griezmann and Mbappe than they are about the now-36-year-old AC Milan forward. That has allowed Giroud to get better chances this time around, and he’s capitalized on those chances.
Giroud is second on the team with four goals (to Mbappe’s five). He and Mbappe are also tied for the team lead in xG (expected goals) with 3.4. His biggest goal of the tournament came in the 78th minute vs. England in the semifinals. That goal won the game for France and pushed them ahead so that they now have a chance to win it all in the France-Argentina final.
In that match, Giroud will match up against Argentina CB Nicolas Otamendi. The Argentine defender is prone to head-scratching fouls in and around the box and defensive lapses at inopportune moments. The French striker will also see Emiliano Martinez aggressively coming out of the keeper’s box at him on set pieces. As France’s biggest aerial threat, either outdueling or drawing a foul on Martinez would be huge for his country in the World Cup final.
And aside from his direct impact on the game by scoring goals, Giroud can also play a key X-factor role by making the runs he did in 2018, and pulling attention away from Mbappe and Griezmann. The latter hasn’t scored this tournament, but in the right situation in the final, with the right run by Giroud, he could also be a difference-maker.
At 36, this will be the last time we see Giroud at a World Cup. And while his finishing has been frustrating to French fans over the course of his international career, he’s been an absolutely crucial player in some of France’s best World Cup performances over the last 12 years.
His final time on a World Cup field will be in the France-Argentina game on Sunday. And while Mbappe and Griezmann and goalkeeper Hugo Lloris and manager Didier Deschamps will get the bulk of the headlines going into this matchup, don’t be surprised if Giroud is the name on everyone’s lips when the final whistle sounds.
Like Zito, Vava, and Amarildo sixty years ago, getting to a World Cup final might be all about the Mbappe’s and Pele’s of the world, but winning one sometimes comes down to which side’s X-factor steps up in the biggest moment. And if Giroud is that guy on Sunday, then France will write its name in the history books right next to the 1958-62 Brazil side.
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