Both arriving over the course of the past year, Lucas Digne and Boubacar Kamara will have been hoping to make Didier Deschamps’ team at the World Cup.
The left-back, while a regular at Everton, didn’t get on with Rafa Benitez and was also a sacrificial lamb to bolster the Merseyside club’s finances.
He was therefore sent elsewhere, while the defensive midfielder’s contract at Marseille was running out and ended up convinced by Steven Gerrard to move to Villa Park.
That being said, Aston Villa’s rather poor start to the season hasn’t helped their cause, with both being left out of the latest squad announced by the France manager for the two Nations League games.
With the national team having nothing to play for, these are essentially friendlies, and it would have been a great chance for both players to show Deschamps that, despite their struggles at club level, they have what it takes to impact his team.
For Digne, who spent a good run of three years often being called up, his ‘too plain’ start to the season is at fault here, and he risks, just like he did in 2018, missing out on a spot to another World Cup.
As for Kamara, the numbers of injuries in midfield meant this was his real chance to make it, but Deschamps’ decision to call up the likes of Youssouf Fofana says a lot of where the Aston Villa man lies in the pecking order.
They still have a few months to change Deschamps’ mind, but as L’Equipe explain, all these players who were called up previously but haven’t this time around are now in ‘a race against the clock’.
