By IANS,
London : French striker Thierry Henry finds himself out of favour with coach Raymond Domenech and faces more time on the bench in South Africa during the football World Cup.
Henry, a former captain, has been France’s most prolific scorer with 51 goals from 121 caps. He started on the bench in all three warm-up games and is expected to do the same at the World Cup finals for the 1998 winners and 2006 finalists.
The 32-year-old, who has been pushed on the fringes at Barcelona and is in the twilight of his career, said he had no problems with having lost his place up front to Nicolas Anelka.
“There’s a logic in football. Over the past four months, I have not played that much. There’s a player in front of me and that’s Nico. I accept that,” Henry was quoted as saying by the Daily Telegraph.
After Lassana Diarra was ruled out of the World Cup by illness, Domenech decided to field just one holding midfielder instead of two and go for a bolder 4-3-3 formation, a move many fans had been waiting years for.
Whether that will be enough for France, who were to reach their World Cup base at Knysna on Saturday, to recapture their old form remains doubtful.
A French renaissance was far from obvious after they slumped to a 0-1 defeat by China on the French Indian Ocean island of Reunion in their final warm-up on Friday.
Domenech, however, saw positive signs.
“I think we are improving,” he told reporters, judging that France had played better than in a 2-1 win over Costa Rica and a 1-1 draw in Tunisia.
“I’m not saying it was perfect, but it was better. Having lost will force us to be more careful, more inspired and to work harder.”