The contributions here cover the major socio-economic, political, cultural and sporting dimensions of the 1998 World Cup. It is set within the sporting context of the history and organization of French football and the French tradition of using major sporting events to focus world attention.

To describe the World Cup as a soccer tournament is equivalent to calling Mount Everest a rather steep hill, Niagara Falls an interesting water feature and the Great Wall of China merely a boundary fence. World Cup France 98 will be massive: a sports spectacle that will transfix billions of people worldwide. Thirty-two countries playing 64 matches, over the course of four hot weeks in June and July, across the length and breadth of France...It isn't just important, it means everything!

The contributions here cover the major socio-economic, political, cultural and sporting dimensions of the 1998 World Cup. It is set within the sporting context of the history and organization of French football and the French tradition of using major sporting events to focus world attention.

When France both hosted and won the World Cup in 1998, the face of its star player, Zinedine Zidane, the son of Algerian immigrants, was projected onto the Arc de Triomphe. During the 2006 World Cup finals, Zidane stunned the country by ending his spectacular career with an assault on an Italian player. In Soccer Empire, Laurent Dubois illuminates the connections between empire and sport by tracing the story of World Cup soccer, from the Cup’s French origins in the 1930s to Africa and the Caribbean and back again. As he vividly recounts the lives of two of soccer’s most electrifying players, Zidane and his outspoken teammate, Lilian Thuram, Dubois deepens our understanding of the legacies of empire that persist in Europe and brilliantly captures the power of soccer to change the nation and the world.

France 98 and Scotland. Craig Brown's boys on the World Cup stage. But what do we remember about this tournament? Where were we at the time? In France? At home? Watching in the pub? Perhaps we were too young and want to know more? Join us on this trip back to the late 1990s. Follow Scotland's nailbiting progress through qualification. Find out how two of Scotland's greatest players, Ally McCoist and Andy Goram were sensationally left out of the final squad. Learn how Hendry, Collins, Lambert, Burley and company showed the very best and perhaps some of the most disappointing of Scottish football. Relive the glorious afternoon in Paris when Craig Brown's proud Scotland team opened the tournament in opposition to the world champions: Ronaldo's Brazil! Join Neil Doherty on this trip down memory lane, back to that colourful summer in the French sun in World Cup 1998: Scotland's Story.

Annotation France has in recent years emerged as a bellwether for worldwide anxieties around postcolonialism and multiculturalism, and the rise of right-wing populism. This book offers a detailed exploration of the dynamics and dilemmas of the present moment of crisis and hope in France through an exploration of a number of recent moral panics. Paul Silverstein here examines urban racial violence, female Islamic dress and male public prayer, anti-system gangster rap, and sports - all of which have triggered major national debates over France's multicultural future.

Remember when Zinédine Zidane lifted the World Cup in 1998? Kylian Mbappé doesn't. The forward wasn't born when the French team first became world champions. But it was Mbappé's unique talent that helped France reach the summit of world football once again in 2018, erasing years of failure, rancour and shame. For Les Bleus, the road between these two highs was blighted by bitterly painful lows. Zidane's headbutt; a players' strike; infighting and recriminations; even sex scandals and blackmail. Mbappé witnessed it all as he honed his prodigious talent in the banlieues of Paris, and his story embodies France's journey from disaster to triumph. In Sacré Bleu, Matthew Spiro traces the rise, fall and rise again of Les Bleus through the lens of Kylian Mbappé. Featuring a foreword by Arsène Wenger and interviews with leading figures in French football, Spiro asks what went wrong for France and what, ultimately, went right.