Didier Deschamps Biography

Didier Deschamps, born in Bayonne on October 15, 1968, is a French former football player and current coach, who played as a defensive midfielder. At the moment he is the head coach of France national team.

As a football player, he won three French championships ( one was revoked) and a UEFA Champions League with Olympique Marseille, three Italian championships, an Italian Cup, two Italian Super Cups, a Champions League, an Intercontinental Cup, and a UEFA Super Cup with Juventus and a FA Cup with Chelsea. He also was named the best French footballer by France Football in 1996.

As a football manager, he lifted a French League Cup with Monaco and three more League Cups, a French League, and two French Super Cups with Olympique Marseille. Furthermore, he led Juventus in the 2006-2007 Serie B championship, reaching promotion to Serie A and winning the tournament.

All You Need to Know About Didier Deschamps Biography

He was world champion in 1998 and European champion in 2000 with the French national team, on both occasions as captain. He then led the Bleus to the victory of the 2018 World Cup; along with Mario Zagallo and Franz Beckenbauer, he is one of only three individuals in the world football who have won the World Cup as both players and coaches.

Didier Deschamps Information

In this section of

Didier Deschamps biography

, we will share some general information about him such as

Didier Deschamps nationality

to let you know him much better.

Didier Deschamps Bio

• Full Name: Didier Claude Vincent Deschamps

• Nickname: The water-carrier

• Profession: Professional Footballer

Didier Deschamps Physical Stats

• Weight: 71 Kg

• Height: 1.74 m

• Eye Color: Brown

• Hair Color: Black

Didier Deschamps Football Information

• Position: Defensive Midfielder

• Jersey Number: 7

• Professional Debut: 1985

Didier Deschamps Date of Birth and Personal Info

• Date of Birth: 15 October 1968

• Birth Place: Bayonne, France

• Zodiac Sign: Libra

• Nationality: French

Stay tuned as in this section of

Didier Deschamps biography

we want to share some information about

Didier Deschamps childhood

.

Didier Deschamps Early Life

Born in the clinic in the Lachepaillet district of Bayonne, Didier Deschamps was the second son of Pierre and Ginette. Didier was a quiet and hard-working student at the Sutar school in Anglet. After finishing his homework, he rushed to play ball alone, with his neighbors or cousins. Nevertheless, he didn't want to join a football club.

Later, the kid from Anglet joined the Catholic school Saint-Bernard in Bayonne. Between attending catechism classes and revising his lessons, Didier discovered sport with his friends. He played football at break time on the small pitch of the public school and experimented with swimming, cross-country running, and middle-distance running through the UNSS.

When he was in fifth grade, in the Minimes category, he became French school champion in the 1,000 meters. He also played handball, long jump, and rugby. He was eleven years old when he decided to try football. He decided to join the Aviron Bayonnais, where Christian Sarramagna, Félix Lacuesta and Jean-Louis Cazes all started out.

Didier Deschamps Profile

He was spotted by

scouts at the age of 15 in the Ligue d'Aquitaine and signed a contract with them in April 1983. Only two years in the youth sector of FCN, famous for being one of the best in France, was enough for him to prove his talent.

He was promoted to the first team in 1985 and on 27 September, at the age of seventeen, he debuted in the Première Division in a victorious away win over Brest. His four seasons at Nantes were crucial to the rest of his career: he failed to win any trophies for a club in the middle of the table at the time, yet he gained a lot of experience, playing 111 games in the league. In his final season in the yellow-green shirt, he was also called up for the first time for the French national team coached by Michel Platini.

Stay tuned as in this section of

Didier Deschamps biography

we want to share some information about his career at Bordeaux and OM.

Olympique Marseille and Bordeaux

He moved to Olympique Marseille in 1989 for 17 million francs. He was often forced to sit on the bench in his first season with the white and blue team, only playing 17 games with one goal, the majority of them as a substitute during the game.

However, he was voted France Football's revelation of the year and won his first league title, although he had problems settling in at the club. In order not to jeopardize his place in the national team at the end of the year, he accepted a loan transfer to

.

His season with the Girondins was crucial for his career: he played regularly and at the end of it, having played 29 games, he returned to Bernard Tapie's club in the summer of 1991. At first, Tapie wanted to use him as a bargaining chip with Paris Saint-Germain in the negotiation to bring Jocelyn Angloma to the Marseille team, but the young midfielder was firmly opposed. He played 36 league games in the 1991-1992 season, scoring 4 goals, and won his second national title, his first as a star player.

The 1992-93 season was his crowning achievement. On 26 May 1993, he and Olympique Marseille went down in French football history as they won their first continental title, the Champions League. Deschamps was named captain of the team and lifted the cup in the final in Munich, beating

1-0. The OM became the first French club to become European champions.

The following season, 1993-94, Deschamps played 34 games in a league that the team finished second. Nevertheless, at the end of the season, after Tapie was accused of organizing the VA-OM offense, the French federation officially relegated the team to D2. Deschamps left Marseille and France because he wanted to play in a more competitive league.

Stay tuned as in this section of Didier Deschamps biography we want to share some information about his Juventus career.

Juventus

In April 1994 Juventus, anticipating the times, captured Deschamps as his contract was expiring and he could be picked up from Olympique Marseille, according to the UEFA rules that in the pre-Bosman era governed the free players' market, paying an amount of three and a half billion lire.

The following month the Bayonne midfielder officially signed with the Italian club. David's team was a new side, far from the Scudetto for nine years and they had just changed a lot, both on the field and in the office. The adventure of the Frenchman in Juventus did not start in the best way: he was injured with surgery on his left Achilles tendon in October and stayed away from the field for almost half the season.

After his recovery, he became immediately indispensable, forming with the other new signing Paulo Sousa a great midfield duo, which led the Turin team to win the

and the Coppa Italia. They also reached the final of the UEFA Cup lost against

.

With a strong ability to press all over the field and to fight, as well as a strong tactical sense, he was immediately recognized by Marcello Lippi for his flexibility, his spirit of sacrifice, and his tactical intelligence; Lippi entrusted him with the Bianconeri's midfield for the following season in which the club struggled for the Scudetto; Milan immediately left the Bianconeri behind and, despite an attempt to catch up with them at the end of the season, they finished the tournament in second place.

The story was different in the Champions League: in fact, Deschamps was the pivot of the team that, after an enthusiastic path in the previous rounds, defeated

at the Olimpico in Rome on 22 May 1996 on penalties; this was the second triumph in the highest European competition, both for the Juventus club and for the midfielder. Earlier in the season, he had already put in his trophy case the Italian Super Cup.

He was again a protagonist in the 1996-1997 season, which was packed with trophies for the Frenchman and his teammates. On November 27, 1996, he won the Intercontinental Cup by beating Argentina's River Plate in Tokyo. After defeating

in a two-leg match (1-6 away and 3-1 at home), on February 6, 1997, he lifted the UEFA Super Cup. He contributed, with 26 appearances and 1 goal, to win the Scudetto in the centenary year of the Turin club, and reached the final of the Champions League where the team was defeated by Borussia Dortmund.

The next season he won his third Scudetto, the second consecutive with the Juventus team, and the second Super League Cup. They also reached the third consecutive final of the Champions League, which was Didier's fifth European final in six years, however, they lost against Real Madrid.

The 1998-1999 season was difficult not only for Juventus but also for the player: good results did not come, and Lippi started to frequently exclude Deschamps from the starting eleven. Their relationship worsened, as it did with the rest of the locker room, ending with a hard fight between the head coach and the French midfielder before the home match against Parma.

At the end of the season, his only one without any success in Turin, he expressed his wish to quit Juventus because he thought his experience with the club was over. He left the Bianconeri jersey after five seasons, with 4 goals in 178 presences, winning everything: his Juventus collection of trophies includes 3 Serie A titles, 1 Coppa Italia, 1 UEFA Champions League, 1 Intercontinental Cup, 1 UEFA Supercup, and 2 Italian Supercups.

Stay tuned as in this section of Didier Deschamps biography we want to share some information about his career in England and Spain.

Chelsea and Valencia

Didier was released by Juventus in the summer of 1999 and he decided to try his luck in another league. During the summer of 1999, Didier joined

in the Premier League under the management of his former partner from Turin, Gianluca Vialli, and met up with his friend Marcel Desailly.

Chelsea finished only fifth in the league and quarter-finalists in the Champions League. Nevertheless, Deschamps managed to add another title to his list of achievements by winning the English Cup against

.

The last challenge for Deschamps was to sign for Valencia CF, finalists of the last UEFA Champions League, joining his former Marseille teammate Jocelyn Angloma. Following some physical problems and strong competition with David Albelda and Rubén Baraja, Didier made only 21 appearances in all competitions.

However, he played a part in the fifth position in La Liga and Valencia had the best defense with 34 goals conceded, as well as in a new Champions League campaign until the final. Didier remained on the bench in the game lost on penalties against

. Following the 2000-2001 season, Deschamps decided to put an end to his career at the age of 33.

France National Team

He was called up to the French national team for the first time by coach Michel Platini in 1989, when he was 20 years old, and played his debut on April 29 in the match against Yugoslavia in the 1990 World Cup qualifying round, when he replaced Daniel Xuereb at the 76th minute.

His international career started in some of the darkest periods of French football: first, the Bleus missed the qualification to the 1990 World Cup in Italy, then they failed to reach the final phase of the 1992 European Championship, and finally, they couldn't reach the 1994

.

Things changed with the beginning of the Aimé Jacquet era, not only for the French players but also for the Didier Deschamps. Jacquet started to rebuild the team in preparation for the 1996 European Championship, at first giving the captain's armband to Eric Cantona; however, in January 1995, the talented Frenchman ended his career with the national team, against his will, following a nine-month suspension with his club team, because of a violent kick to a fan who had insulted him while he was leaving the field.

With Cantona gone, Jacquet made a decision to revolutionize the starting eleven: out with the older players such as Papin and Ginola, giving space to what would later be called the "golden generation". With these changes in mind, the French coach gave the captain's armband to Deschamps, from the friendly match against

on June 1st, 1996.

He quickly became the leader of the Bleus team and guided them to the semifinals of Euro '96, where they lost in the penalty shoot-out to the Czech Republic, obtaining France's best result in ten years. As captain and leader of the locker room in 1998, he led his national team to its first World Cup victory.

Two years later, while still captain, he guided the Bleus to the victory of the 2000 European Championship, making the Galletti the second national team, after West Germany in 1974, to hold both the World Cup and the Euro at the same time. Furthermore, during the semifinal against Portugal, he reached his 100th match with the national jersey: he became the first French player ever to reach this goal.

On September 2, 2000, he played his last game with the national team at the Stade de

against England; in a match that ended 1-1, he was replaced at 59' by Patrick Vieira. He left the Bleus after 103 presences and 4 goals.

Managerial Career

He decided to end his career as a football player at the age of 33 and to start working on the bench. He rescinded his contract with Valencia, and on June 9, 2001, he was named coach of Monaco.

Monaco

He built a team with a very limited budget, adding to young promises (Givet, Squillaci, Rothen, Evra) experienced players but discarded by some big European clubs (Roma, Nonda, Morientes, Giuly).

His first season in charge of the Monegasque club was far from exciting, as he failed to achieve the primary goal of qualifying for the Champions League: in the league, following a catastrophic start, the team soon broke away from the top positions to finally finish at the 15th place; whereas in the Cup, the team was surprisingly eliminated at the quarter-finals by Nimes, a Division 2 team, thereby missing the last chance of access to European competition.

The next year, notwithstanding the serious financial crisis of the club, he guided his team to a lengthy head-to-head in the league with Olympique Lyon, only losing the title in the last few days. However, he won his first trophy as a coach on 17 May 2003: in the final of the League Cup, his team defeated Sochaux 4-1.

During the 2003-2004 season, he made his masterpiece guiding the club of

: after a difficult summer, he started to have a series of successes in the league and the Champions League. Along the European journey, his team was surprised by the quality of the game.

Having excelled in its group with relative simplicity, inflicting among other things a massive 8-3 win over the Deportivo La Coruña, the club got the better of Lokomotiv Moscow in the round of 16 and then of the Real Madrid in the quarters: in the double confrontation with the Spaniards, after having lost the first leg at the Bernabéu for 4-2, the team recovered the original disadvantage of 1-0 and beat the favored Merengues for 3-1.

They eliminated Chelsea in the semifinals and qualified for the final in Gelsenkirchen against Porto, managed by José Mourinho. The French team's dream was shattered in the last act: they played a poor game in the final and were defeated 3-0 by the Portuguese.

His fourth season in charge of Monaco proved to be a difficult one for the coach. After a positive start in the league, finally, the team finished third in Ligue 1 and qualified for the

preliminaries. After 4 defeats in 7 matches of the league and above all after the elimination to the last preliminary round of Champions League in the match against Sevilla, he resigned from his position.

Juventus

He returned to coaching, this time at Juventus after almost a year of inactivity, on 10 July 2006, when he accepted a complicated task, with the Bianconeri going through the most difficult moment of their history. Following Calciopoli, the team was in the meantime downgraded to Serie B with a strong penalty in the standings.

Deschamps found himself at the helm of a team that was only a far cry from the one that had seen him as a footballer, without many big players who had been sold due to financial constraints and because some of them did not accept to play in the lower series; so the coach decided to start, alongside the few remaining veterans, several young players from the youth academy, in particular the future Juventus star Claudio Marchisio.

After an up and down start, because of the impact with an environment very different from what was usually popular with the Lady, the team started to climb positions in the standings until 20 May 2007, when three days in advance they won the championship and got the mathematical promotion to Serie A.

Despite having brought the Bianconeri back to the top echelon of Italian football, a feat recognized de facto by Juventus fans and the press, Deschamps could never boast de jure of this triumph as just five days later he surprisingly terminated his contract with the club, due to conflicts with the management concerning the club's future plans; as a result, the team's season was ended by assistant coach Giancarlo Corradini for the last, and by now irrelevant, two games.

Olympique Marseille

Deschamps was announced by Olympique Marseille on 5 May 2009 to succeed Eric Gerets as manager of the club. He guided OM to victory in the French League Cup on 27 March 2010, defeating Bordeaux 3-1 in the final, marking Marseille's first success in the competition and their first trophy in 17 years. By defeating Rennes 3-1 on 5 May 2010, and at the same time as Auxerre's defeat in Lyon, OM won the ninth title in its history, eighteen years after the previous one.

He led the

side to victory in the French Super Cup on 28 July 2010, beating Paris Saint-Germain 5-4 on penalties. He was voted French coach of the year by France Football magazine in December of the same year.

French national team

He was appointed head coach of the French national team on 8 July 2012. He was able to qualify the Bleus for the 2014 World Cup with some difficulty, only at the play-offs, having come back against Ukraine in the decisive return match. At the final stage in Brazil, with a very young roster, France made it to the quarter-finals, where they lost to Germany (0-1), the winner of the tournament.

He then guided the national team to the 2016 European Championship hosted by France, where Deschamps was able to take the Bleus to the final in Paris after eliminating, notably, reigning world champions Germany in the semi-finals; although favored by the odds, the hosts were defeated by Portugal in extra time (0-1) in the final game.

The following two years he stayed with the national team and, albeit with some difficulty, reached qualification for the 2018 World Cup. After winning his group ahead of Denmark in Russia, and defeating Argentina in the Round of 16, Uruguay in the quarter-finals, and Belgium in the semi-finals, Deschamps' 4-2 win over Croatia in the final in Moscow on 15 July saw France win their second World Cup.

This success brought him into the ranks of world champions as both player and coach, after Franz Beckenbauer of Germany and Mário Zagallo of Brazil. He was also the most capped coach in French history during the competition, surpassing Raymond Domenech's previous record at the Argentina game.

France topped their group in the 2020 European Championship qualifiers and, in their final game of the group, in which they won 0-2 against Albania, he made his 100th appearance as Blues' head coach.

Stay tuned as in this section of Didier Deschamps biography we want to share some information about his playing style.

Style of Play

Deschamps was a defensive midfielder with great personality and temperament, which Deschamps himself said derived from his border origins - 'I am Basque [...] and I have the stubbornness of my people. When we get something into our heads, we want to achieve it' - to the point of being compared to former Juventus player Giuseppe Furino on his arrival in Turin.

A left-footer, his tactical awareness, and speed of movement allowed him to be very effective in the rebound phase, showing particular excellence in tackling; equipped with an excellent basic technique, it also allowed him to restart the action and move forward in turn, despite his defensive nature led him more to put forward for his team-mates than to look for a goal.

Reception

Many football experts say that Deschamps is definitely one of the greatest midfielders in the history of French football and with the great results he is getting with the France national team, he is a great head coach too.

Goal Celebration

Didier Deschamps never had a signature goal celebration to his name, and because he played mainly as a defensive midfielder, he had not many goals during his career. He also celebrated in a different manner after scoring goals for the teams he played.

Didier Deschamps outside Football

In early 2001, the television channel TPS gave him a program called Deschamps Contrechamp, a show he hosted and in which he received guests from the world of soccer, so other than football, he has experience as a TV host.

Didier Deschamps Personal Life

In this section of Didier Deschamps biography, we will take a look at his personal life and share some information about

Didier Deschamps life story

and

Didier Deschamps religion

.

Family, Children, and Relationships

Together with Philippe, the eldest of three, his parents lived in a house in the green countryside of Basque Country. His mother, Ginette Deschamps, worked as a wool saleswoman and her husband as a painter at the Direction départementale de l'équipement. For many years, Pierre had lived to the rhythm of the amateur rebounds of the ball, playing the third row under the famous Biarritz Olympique jersey.

He married Claude (born 1966), a native of Brittany, from Concarneau. The two met in Nantes where she was studying to become a speech therapist. The couple has been living together since 1985 and are the parents of a boy named Dylan, born in May 1996.

Philanthropy

Deschamps has always been a part of many charity events and he has also played in many charity matches to raise funds for charitable causes. He and the other players of the World Cup winner France team have founded an association named France 98 to organize charity events.

Legal Issues

During his career as a player and manager, he had some legal issues. In one case, after his former teammate at France national team, Eric Cantona, said to the press that his team selection for the Euro 2016 is racially motivated, Didier Deschamps filed a legal complaint against him. A court in Paris ruled that Didier Deschamps’ complaint has not clearly defined for defamation and thus, the case has been declared void.

Didier Deschamps Career Statistics

In this section of Didier Deschamps biography, we will take a look at his career stats both on the club and international level.

Club

In a 16 years club-level football career, Didier Deschamps played a total of 556 matches for Nantes, Marseille, Bordeaux, Juventus, Chelsea, and Valencia and scored 21 goals. He spent the biggest part of his career at Juventus between 1994 and 1999.

International

Between 1989 and 2000, Deschamps made 103 appearances with the France national team and scored 4 goals for his country, notably winning the 1998 World Cup and Euro 2000 with them.

Managerial

So far, Didier has been head coach of Monaco, Juventus, Marseille, and France national team and managed them in a total of 527 matches, winning 285, drawing 130, and losing in 112 of them. He has an average winning ratio of 54.08 percent as of 8 June 2021.

Didier Deschamps Honors

He has won many of his club level titles and awards with Juventus. His most notable club titles and awards include UEFA Champions League, Serie A, Coppa Italia, Intercontinental Cup, and FA Cup, among others.

On the international level, he has won the 1998 World Cup and Euro 2000 as the captain of the France national team.

As a manager, he has also won many titles including Coupe de la Ligue, Serie B, Ligue 1, and the FIFA World Cup.

Of his notable personal awards, we can include Ligue 1 Manager of the Year, The Best FIFA Football Coach, Globe Soccer Awards Coach of the Year, and IFFHS World's Best National Coach, and some others.

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