France’s men come into the EuroHockey U21 Championship in Terrassa riding high off the back of their stunning silver medal at last year’s Junior World Cup in Kuala Lumpur.
While some big stars like Gaspard Xavier, Noé Jouin, Stan Branicki, Mathis Clément and Brieuc Delemazure have moved on, there are still eight of that panel in situ, hungry to add more glory.
To do so would be a breakthrough of sorts. Their only medal at this level came in 1984 in Rome while they were in fifth place in Ghent two years ago.
This time around, the side is captained by Louis Haertelmeyer with CAM92 club mates Tom Gaillard and Rafael Stab key men.
Hugo Verrier (Saint Germain, Victor Saint-Martin (White Star in Belgium), Antoine Robert (FC Lyon) and Tassilo Sure (DSD Düsseldorf in Germany) are the others continuing from their Malaysian adventure last year.
At the other end of the spectrum, five players step up from the Under-18 team that won Championship II gold in Türkiye last summer. From that crew, Aristide Michaelis scored nine times in five games at that level.
James Liddiard, Arthur Morcrette and Gabriel Piole also move up as does Malo Martinache – the Lille man holds the record as the youngest player to line out in the Euro Hockey League at 15 years, 5 months and 21 days.
Piole (two) and Morcrette combined for three goals against Türkiye’s Under-18s last summer in a 5-0 win and they will face many of those players once more this week.
France’s group phase is an enticing one, particularly the rematch of their World Cup meetings with Germany – the French won the initial group meeting in Malaysia 2-0 but came undone in the final 2-1.
In their preparations, they drew twice with England and lost 1-0 in a close-run series of games.
Best performance: Bronze (1984)
