Futsal world cup 2024: Pierre Jacky on France hitting its targets
Pierre Jacky, now a UEFA technical observer, says patience and precision enabled France to grow during his long tenure as men's futsal team coach Photograph: Jamie Fahey
• World Cup 2024 game-changers series:
2) The legacy-builder
“PHYSICAL EDUCATION teachers didn't even know the term ‘futsal’ 20 years ago,” says Pierre Jacky, reflecting on the remarkable rise of French futsal since the dawn of the millennium.
France’s status as the coming nation of European futsal is clear, says the former long-serving head coach of the men’s national team and architect of the remarkable progress that leaves the French Football Federation (FFF) as an example for all national associations (not just in Europe) on how to grow the game of futsal in sustainable fashion.
The presence of the men’s national team in Uzbekistan in the 10th Fifa futsal World Cup this month testifies to the success at the elite level. Now under the tutelage of Jacky’s successor, Raphaël Reynaud, Les Bleus go into the tournament as one of the tournament’s dark horses ready to face Guatemala on 16 September in Bukhara in their debut encounter before taking on Venezuela and Iran.
Led by Souheil Mouhoudine, Abdessamad Mohammed and the globetrotting captain, Kevin Ramirez – who celebrated reaching 100 caps in a friendly victory over Uzbekistan in August – the squad is also rich with youthful exuberance, with Barcelona’s exciting 22-year-old winger one of two Mamadou Toures expected to play a key role in the finals.
For Jacky, however, France’s ascent is about much more than the men’s national team.
The FFF has hit its targets in all aspects of futsal development – from the restructuring of the D1 and national league system to the expansion of the famous pole academy to nurture teenage talent and the embrace of the women’s game with a new national team.
The only wayward effort in a run of pinpoint accuracy was perhaps the failure of the bid to host the 2026 men’s futsal Euros, which Uefa awarded to Latvia and Lithuania.
Importantly, the progress has won the backing of none other than Philippe Diallo, the president of the FFF, who hailed futsal as “the number one school sport for girls and boys with nearly 200,000 young practitioners” when reaffirming the federation’s commitment to the sport in 2023.
Jacky, who is now a UEFA technical observer for futsal tournaments, tells futsalstreetspot.com all about this remarkable legacy of 20 years of hard graft in a wide-ranging interview that includes fascinating insights on:
Starting out in football (alongside a future global icon)
Pride in leading the French futsal revolution for two decades
Memories of one of the most iconic futsal World Cup tournaments in history
Hopes and predictions for Uzbekistan 2024
The French stars he expects to shine
The evolution of the game and potential law changes to enhance the sport
What makes futsal a uniquely attractive sport to play, watch and coach
Pierre Jacky’s Story
Football origins
I never played futsal in a club because it didn't exist in France when I was younger. I played football. As a teenager I played with some good players in the B team of Racing Club Strasbourg in the national 3rd division. I was a midfielder. One of my team-mates was Arséne Wenger. We played in midfield together when he was not orchestrating proceedings in the libero position. A couple of years later, as a professional, I was twice champion of 3rd division in 80/81 and 81/82 and also runners-up in 1982 World University Championships representing France.
Later I coached in national division 3 and was also assistant coach of the Racing Club de Strasbourg training centre. Finally, in 1996 I joined the FFF as Regional Technical Director of the Alsace league.
The switch to futsal
It was about this time that I really began futsal as assistant to Jacques Devisme and then to James Doyen when we created the France futsal team (1997-2004).
In March 1997, when the FFF decided to launch the futsal team, Jacques Devisme asked me to be his assistant. I remember the first game vividly. It was a friendly match against the U21s of Belgium. We didn't even know the futsal rules but we won 2-1. Then I became the head coach in 2004.
And I remained in the role until 2021, taking charge for 216 matches in total, including making history by qualifiying for a first ever UEFA Euros finals in Slovenia in 2018.
At the beginning of my time in charge, things were very different though. We only had a national cup played by football clubs in the winter. We had to create futsal clubs and specific regional championships around 2004, from which we then set up a national championship in 2009.
How do I sum up the journey French futsal has been on in the past 20 years?
Well, firstly, I never wanted an artificial position of the France team that does not correspond to the situation of practise in our clubs. I could have created and put all the financial means on the national team by multiplying training camps and gatherings, creating elite and specialist courses, naturalising Brazilian players … but on the contrary, I wanted to root futsal through a more solid base.
World Cup memories
My first strong recollection of the World Cup is the one in Guatemala in 2000 because it was the first I attended and also because FIFA had invited me to participate in a congress organized on this occasion where I had my eyes opened to a whole new world.
Since then, the World Cup that stands out for me is probably the 2008 one because it was played in the emblematic country of Brazil, with a great Falcão who made his team win.
Uzbekistan 2024
My hopes for debutants France
Since 2022 and our players are professionals, Raphaël Reynaud has been able to continue our progress and around a reinforced staff has been able to build an increasingly complete team that can beat anyone.
The very good friendly results such as the victory against Brazil at the tournament in Lithuania are not a coincidence and make all nations wary of France.
The game of predictions
As a coach, it's difficult for me to say and I don't like guessing who will win. All I will say is that I sincerely think that France can be added as a surprise team to the usual giants such as Brazil, Argentina, Spain or Portugal.
Players to look out for
All the usual players from the big teams will no doubt shine. But I hope we will have to add players like Abdessamad Mohammed or Souheil Mouhoudine to that stellar list after the tournament.
Among the younger players, I hope to be surprised by one or the other youngsters, especially talents from the U19 teams. It would be good for futsal to have new, younger stars emerge because, in my opinion, we gave too much prominence to veterans during the last edition of the World Cup.
My view on current technical or tactical trends
Good teams will have to be less and less stereotyped and be able to move from one organisation to another during the same action. Whether offensively by mastering the different systems with or without pivots or defensively by adapting the heights of the block. There will also be the participation of the goalkeeper at all times, without necessarily waiting for the traditional powerplay at the end of the match.
For the players, they will have to be more and more complete, very strong physically in particular.
We will surely often see teams play with two left-footed players on the court and if possible more and more players with two strong feet, which is a huge advantage.
The Future Game
Which law changes on the pitch or rule/governance change off the pitch would I like to see in futsal?
I'll wait until the end of the tournament to answer this one! But for now, it is clear that futsal has already evolved very well in recent years from the point of view of the laws of the game and that football would benefit from being inspired by one or other of our rules (the stopping clock, the backpass to the goalkeeper etc…)
“Football would benefit from one or other of our rules (the clock, the backpass to the keeper etc)”
The novelty that we are talking about in futsal at the moment is the “kick-throw-in”, for which the player would have the choice of playing it by hand or with his feet, seems interesting to me and could also be applied to football.
The federations leading the way as examples for countries such as England, where the game has huge potential for growth
The Spanish Federation is still an example in the organisation of futsal after all these years. I myself was very much inspired by the advice of the former national team coaches Javier Lozano and José Venancio López.
However, for a federation that is just starting out, the Spanish are probably an unattainable objective at first.
Instead, these federations could take more inspiration from France or of course Portugal, who have been able to reach the top of the sport in just 20 years.
My thoughts on how to describe the unique attractions of futsal
Futsal is to football a bit like 3v3 on a basket is to basketball 5v5 with the big success it had at the Olympics in 2024. In other words, futsal is "condensed" football, everything happens in front of goal, so everything is important. It goes rapidly from one goal to the next, there are a lot of shots and a lot of goals. Each player is always involved. They have to make the right decisions all the time; that’s what makes it also a good game for learning football.
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