FRANCE 98 – Bordeaux Stadium

On Thursday 11 June this year, the Stade Lescure will be hosting the first of the six FRANCE 98 matches to be played at Bordeaux. Sixty years earlier, almost to the day, Lescure was inaugurated on the occasion of the 1938 World Cup.

It was, in fact, on 12 June that a quarter-final game in the third World Cup was played in the brand-new stadium. The Brazilians were facing Czechoslovakia, a match that ended in a draw (1-1 after extra-time). In those days, there was no such thing as a penalty shoot-out, so the match had to be replayed two days later, again in the Stade Lescure. This time Brazil beat Czechoslovakia 2-1 but went down 1-2 in the semi-final at Marseille to Italy, the eventual World Cup winners.

The Brazilians returned to Bordeaux on 19 June for the third-place play-off game against Sweden, which they won 4-2.