Dembele's poor performance in the FIFA World Cup semifinals drew criticism from French media outlet L'Équipe.

On Tuesday night in Dallas, France's 0-2 loss to Spain in the semifinal brought Dembele, the Ballon d'Or winner, back to his pre-FIFA World Cup form – he consistently failed to play a truly decisive role in important matches for the French team.

A review of Dembele's performance against Spain in Dallas on Tuesday is a brutal examination for himself and anyone willing to look closely, but this brutality is all the more unbelievable: how can a player with such talent, such experience, who just won the Champions League with Paris Saint-Germain by defeating Arsenal (1-1 on aggregate, 4-3 on penalties), and is on track to contend for the Ballon d'Or for the second consecutive year, fall into such a void in a FIFA World Cup semifinal, on the threshold of glory?

Perhaps there are some explanations that may surface later, or perhaps never, as candor is always scarce when it comes to missed opportunities.

Of course, he ran a lot, maintaining his usual effort, but he wasn't always in sync with his teammates—in one pressing situation in the first half, he realized his teammates weren't approaching the situation in the same way and became annoyed. However, his breakdown with the ball was the most striking, with an astonishing number of technical errors, repeatedly preventing France from capitalizing on those few successful transitions from defense to attack and sporadic high presses.

He barely created any threats in one-on-one situations, and his passes were frequently inaccurate. His mediocrity in this match was almost as incomprehensible as Deschamps' decision to keep him on the field, waiting for a moment of inspiration. That spark never appeared, and whether watching the first or second replay, no true defense could be found for him.

Although Olise's performance in this match was also categorized in the same league as Dembele's, a closer look at the first half reveals at least two or three positive contributions from the Bayern player—he didn't complete a single dribble, but he received the ball two or three times, allowing France's attack to unfold slightly. In particular, he created a rare breakthrough for Barcola in the early stages. However, no similar moments can be found in Dembele's performance in this match.

People might celebrate him for finally leaving tangible statistics in a major national team tournament. 5 goals (including a hat-trick against Norway's reserve team) and 2 assists, this record is much better than his pre-FIFA World Cup data—he only had 3 goals in his previous 33 national team appearances, and the assist against Brazil (2-1) in March ended a long streak of 25 national team matches without an assist.

He started from a low point, and these numbers are incomparable to his previous performance, but he hasn't progressed much. Because there has always been a fundamental disconnect: the gap between him as a superstar at the club level and him as a still too mediocre player for France against Spain. Since the winter of 2024, he has become a different player. He has reinvented himself at Paris Saint-Germain, winning the Champions League twice, becoming a powerful engine in these campaigns, praised for his new efficiency, his way of initiating pressing and dedicating himself, and his leadership at the core of what is perhaps the best team in Europe and even the world.

Dembele became the sixth French player to win the Ballon d'Or after Kopa, Platini, Papin, Zidane, and Benzema, and he had the opportunity to lift the Ballon d'Or for the second consecutive year. But instead, he confirmed the curse—no Ballon d'Or winner has ever become a FIFA World Cup champion in the same year—and the reason often used to describe his different existence in two worlds, that he didn't play as a center forward, cannot explain his performance in this semifinal. He still has a chance, perhaps in four years.

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