Former France Coach Drops Lawsuit; Deschamps–Benzema Case Closed

Didier Deschamps has dropped his complaint against a controversial French football pundit. The complaint concerned defamatory claims made about him at the time Karim Benzema was left out of the French national team.

According to Sport Se, former head coach of the French national team Didier Deschamps withdrew the complaint against Daniel Riolo, a well-known expert of RMC Radio, and in this way, the controversial case of Karim Benzema's exclusion from the Qatar World Cup list was closed in the judicial authorities.

While the appeal court session of this case was supposed to be held on January 13, 2027 in Paris, Deschamps decided to withdraw his complaint against the French expert. Laurent Merle, the lawyer of Daniel Riolo, confirmed this news and announced that Deschamps sent his official withdrawal to the court on September 21, and contrary to some media reports, this legal dispute has ended.

The story of this complaint goes back to the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. In several episodes of RMC Radio's famous "After Foot" program, Daniel Riolo severely questioned the way Karim Benzema's injury was managed by the technical staff and accused the then head coach of France of having lied about the real reasons for the former Ittihad striker's departure from the national team camp.

Deschamps sued Riolu for defamation, but the lower court acquitted the RMC radio expert. At first, Deschamps protested this decision and appealed, but in the end, he stopped pursuing the case and the controversy of the former Real Madrid star's exclusion from the national team camp will end, at least for the time being.