Dr. Lindsay Sarah Krasnoff
Clinical Assistant Professor at the Tisch Institute for Global Sport, New York University
She teaches and conducts research on sports diplomacy, focused on basketball, football (soccer), and Franco-American sports diplomacy. Author of Basketball Empire: France and the Making of a Global NBA and WNBA (Bloomsbury, 2023) and The Making of Les Bleus: Sport in France, 1958-2010 (Lexington Books, 2013), she directs the FranceAndUS project.
Twitter: @Lempika7
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lindsaysarahkrasnoff
Email: lsk222@nyu.edu
France’s FIFA 2026 campaign made a memorable mark in the United States, even if it fell short of winning a third World Cup.
Les Bleus dazzled U.S. audiences en route to contesting their third straight semifinal, a rarified feat. The team’s star talent, led by talisman and Golden Boot winner Kylian Mbappé, Ballon d’Or winner Ousmane Dembélé, and artist extraordinaire Michael Olise, attracted many. So, too, did their style of play, as longtime manager Didier Deschamps empowered his front line to attack with blistering speed and selfless play. Even the team’s riveting second half comeback in an otherwise inglorious third place match garnered excitement among U.S. commentators, influencers, and casual fans.
But Les Bleus dished up more than just world class football. They reminded Americans of their shared republican bonds, work facilitated by their masterclass in how to be a sports diplomat.
Franco-American relations run deep. Both republics were founded on Enlightenment ideals and forged by revolution. They’ve enjoyed a close, albeit at times quarrelsome, relationship for 250 years that since the late 19th century included sports. Although most visible within basketball, the ties are there within football, too.
Les Bleus wrote a new chapter in the transatlantic story this summer with liberty (liberté) as a cornerstone. France made their basecamp in Boston near Faneuil Hall, “The Cradle of Liberty,” a strategic choice that minimized the team’s travel mileage and optimized their (and their families’) enjoyment of the city. Their away kit reflected the Statue of Liberty, a gift by the French in 1876, with its light green color and bronze Gaelic coq signifying Lady Liberty’s original color and subsequent oxidation. This was the shirt France sported for their July 4knockout match in Philadelphia where, encouraged by a stadium full of U.S. fans who cheered them on, they battled football’s “dark arts” deployed by Paraguay.
Equality (égalité) also featured prominently. Football is one of the France’s most democratic, meritocratic milieus, and one in four boys plays the game. In the aftermath of the USMNT’s Round of 16 exit, discussions around how to “fix” a U.S. pay-to-play youth soccer system looked to their transatlantic counterpart as one in which socio-economic inequality is not a barrier.
A third pillar, fraternity (fraternité), was on display, too. The team’s identity was that of individuals who sacrificed egos, starting spots, and more as they bought into the collective goal of winning. Les Bleus had a common purpose that showed as they played cohesively in most matches. As Bradley Barcola, part of France’s deadly attack, told the press, players “took great pleasure playing together… We play as if we were back in the neighborhood.” That joy was alluring to fans and casual spectators alike.
Les Bleus served as sports diplomats in service to the French republican motto liberté, égalité, fraternité, but it reminded their amis américains of such shared values. And nobody did it better than Mbappé, France’s best-known ambassador to the United States, through his practice as a “diplomat in track suit.”
France’s captain, who as a kid practiced giving press conferences, communicated to American and global audiences what it means to be French today. He described why he felt French on teammate Aurélien Tchouameni’s podcast, “The Bridge,” while appreciating his family’s Cameroonian and Algerian heritage. In the June Vanity Fair, Mbappé discussed his political outspokenness against the country’s far-right-wing as a function of being a citizen first, footballer second. When Paraguayan senator Celeste Amarilla hurled a series of racist abuse his way, Mbappé penned an intelligent, diplomatic yet scathing response on X.
The kid who dreamed of representing France did so as a 27-year-old this summer. Mbappé embodied French excellence as a product of the country’s famed development system, notably the FFF’s élite section at Clairefontaine. It’s a pipeline that produced the most players at FIFA 2026 (99, 26 who played for Les Bleus) and made France the only country to contest the World Cup final four times in the last eight editions. A key part of the French methodology is to create players who are adaptable, creative problem-solvers with high football IQs, which Mbappé exhibited on- and off-pitch. Deschamps described him as “exemplary as a captain and in everything that he does on the pitch” (despite those Kylian Dictator memes).
Mbappé also negotiated American, French, and foreign understandings about the ways an elite footballer can serve as a proactive sports diplomat. Historically, most French players were known for langue du bois (wooden tongue), a reference to how they rarely said much of consequence publicly. Instead, Mbappé (and many of this generation Les Bleus) are comfortable taking the microphone and often discuss how French football’s traits of diversity, unity, tolerance, and community spirit are its strengths.
France did not win the World Cup, but their FIFA 2026 story was a fitting celebration of shared republican bonds during the America at 250 festivities. If the Marquis de Lafayette was the original French celebrity in the United States, building bonds between the two peoples, after this summer France’s penultimate sports diplomat, Kylian Mbappé, has taken on the mantle.
