International Soccer - England Although soccer wasn't invented in England, since documents of early versions of the game were found all across the World, it's the English that modernized soccer and started the international phenomenon that it's become today. They were the first nation to have professional soccer clubs and it's the English that created the Laws of the Game as early as 1863, the "constitution" that is still the book of soccer rules nowadays (obviously, some of the laws were modified to adapt to modern times). You would think the English, being the modern "re-inventors" of soccer, would be the dominant nation in soccer history, but in truth they only managed to win one World Cup in 1966, on home ground. They're still regarded as a force amongst soccer nations though and players such as David Beckham, Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard or Wayne Rooney are international stars.
International Soccer - France Although France was one of the first countries to adopt professional soccer, their early performances were nothing compared to the ones obtained in the past three decades. The string of successes at national team level was sparked by Michel Platini and his 1984 France squad, which won the European Championship hosted on home grounds. Their best years however were at the end of the millennium, when they managed to win the World Cup in 1998 for the first time (again, on home ground), achieve the second European Championship win in the 2000 tournament hosted by the Netherlands and Belgium and recently managed to reach the 2006 World Cup final, a final that they lost after a hard struggle against Italy. Players like Zinedine Zidane, Patrick Vieira, Thierry Henry or Fabien Barthez are stand poles of these recent performances.
