France manager savaged his own team in interview given at half-time of World Cup final

Les Blues were largely outplayed in the opening 45 minutes and found themselves 2-0 down at the break.

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In an unorthodox move, the French boss spoke quickly to media at half-time.

Deschamps is quoted as telling TF1: "We utterly failed to show up in the 1st half.

"We expected [their intensity], we neither had the correct attitude nor the correct response.

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"It will take a lot to worry them and come back.

"They played the first half as if it was the World Cup final, we did not."

Whatever he said in the dressing room managed to inspire his players as they made an astonishing turnaround in the second half.

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Right from the start, Argentina took control of the match.

Their positive beginning was rewarded with a penalty as Angel Di Maria outfoxed Ousmane Dembele, who pushed the winger to the ground as he skipped by.

Lionel Messi made no mistake from the resulting spot-kick, sending Hugo Lloris the wrong way to put Argentina ahead at the midway point of the first half.

France were all over the place and their defence was cut to ribbons as a rampant Argentina attack doubled their lead.

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Messi and Julian Alvarez combined to set Mac Allister in behind the backline and his pinpoint cross was turned home by Di Maria.

Deschamps responded by making two changes before the interval, taking off Olivier Giroud and Dembele and replacing the pair with Randal Kolo Muani and Marcus Thuram.

It took until the 80th minute, but France were offered a penalty lifeline when Muani burst into the box and was adjudged to have been pulled back by Nicolas Otamendi.

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Mbappe stepped up and squeezed his strike past Emiliano Martinez, who guessed the right way but could not prevent the PSG forward from finding the net.

Incredibly, just 97 seconds later France were level.

Kingsley Coman was too strong for Messi and picked out Adrian Rabiot before Mbappe exchanged passes with Thuram and fired past Martinez.