French Players Dance on the Table During Coach’s Press Conference

Watch French players celebrate after forcing into a press conference by France head coach Didier Deschamps.

French players celebrate after bursting into a press conference by France head coach Didier Deschamps.

(Photo: AP)

Didier Deschamps walked into the interview room in the bowels of Luzhniki Stadium and prepared to answer questions for the first time as coach of a World Cup champion.

A noise to his right caused him to turn, and his players rushed in.

A bare-chested Benjamin Mendy jumped onto the table in front of Deschamps, and Florian Thauvin leaped up, too. Olivier Giroud and probably a dozen more giddy buddies sprayed their boss with bubbly, beer, cola and water, singing "On est champions (We are champions)!"

"This is third time I got changed, and I still smell just as bad," Deschamps said through a translator.

(For complete FIFA World Cup 2018 coverage, click here to visit our special WC page)

He lifted the trophy as his nation's captain following the first title at Stade de France in 1998, and now he watched Hugo Lloris raise it in a Russian downpour following Sunday's 4-2 win over Croatia. The 49-year-old joined Brazil's Mario Zagallo (1958-62 as a player, 1970 as a manager) and West Germany's Franz Beckenbauer (1974, 1990) as the only men to play for and coach a world champion.

Well, I don’t really like to talk about myself, but I’m going to be forced to do so a little bit, of course. I had the immense pleasure and immense privilege to live through this as a player 20 years ago, and it was in France, so of course it will be marked in my memory forever. But what the players did today is just as beautiful, is just as strong.

Didier Deschamps 

His players had to be brawny. They lifted Deschamps after the match and flung him into the air, over and over.

"They've always been a little bit mad, my players," he said.

(With inputs from AP)