France boss Didier Deschamps believes Gareth Southgate is underappreciated in England.
The managers will face off when the Three Lions take on Les Bleus in the quarter-finals of the World Cup.
Should England win they will reach their second World Cup semi-final in a row under Southgate, while they also made the final of last year’s European Championship.
Southgate, however, still has his critics and Deschamps believes he is not appreciated enough by those in his home country.
“I very much like Gareth, we have met on a number of occasions and have talked about a number of things,” Deschamps said on Friday.
“If I am understood correctly, not everyone appreciates him so much in his own country. That isn’t because he wasn’t a good footballer himself; he had a long and distinguished career and he is also a very good coach.
“He has enabled England to get some very good results over the years and I very much like him.”
Deschamps has described tomorrow’s game in Qatar as a “winner-takes-all match” and backed Kylian Mbappe to make the difference.
Much has been made about England’s plan to stop this World Cup’s top scorer, with Kyle Walker tipped to go toe-to-toe with a player who has five goals in four games.
“I’m sure England will have prepared to face Kylian, as our previous opponents did, but he is in a position to make the difference,” said Deschamps.
“Even in the last match when he didn’t have his best performance, he didn’t show his top form compared to previous games, he was still decisive.
“We have other players that can be dangerous as well and that helps us not to be over-dependent on Kylian. But Kylian is Kylian, and he always will be. He has that capacity to make the difference at any moment in the match.”
France are the current world champions and are looking to become the first team to retain the World Cup since Brazil in 1958 and 1962.
The French squad has changed since going all the way four years ago, partly due to injury ruling the likes of N’Golo Kante and Paul Pogba out of this tournament, and captain Hugo Lloris believes England have now matured into serious contenders to take their crown.
“If we compare both sides, there were more English players in the World Cup in Russia than French players, and if you look at the English squad they were semi-finalists in the World Cup and runners-up at the last Euros,” said Lloris.
“There is a real progression and I believe this [England] team is getting more mature and ready to compete for trophies. They were a little bit unlucky at the last Euros, they got very close but they are here to win.
“In our side there are a lot of changes with the new generation of players, they are ready to compete because they play for the best teams in Europe, we have a good mixture.
“We have to make sure we will be ready to challenge England on Saturday, because it is going to be a big battle.”
Lloris will omorrow come up against his close friend and Tottenham teammate, Harry Kane.
“I only have positive things to say about Harry, he is a very important player for the team, the club and for the England team as well,” he added.
“He is a real leader, he is an example for his team-mates and he is a top player. He has been decisive for his club and very often he makes the difference.”
Given how well Lloris knows Kane, it was thought that could give France the edge should tomorrow’s match go to penalties. But the goalkeeper said: “Harry has the ability to shoot anywhere, it can be on my right, my left, in the middle. He is one of the best probably in this aspect of the game.”
