What was it really like to mark Ronaldo Nazario at the FIFA World Cup?... Icon opens up about his battle with the Brazil legend

EXCLUSIVE: A FIFA World Cup winner has revealed what his experience was like marking Ronaldo Nazario on the grandest stage of them all.

On July 12, 1998, France played Brazil in the final of the biggest competition in all of sport at the Stade de France in Paris.

Frank Leboeuf opens up about marking Ronaldo Nazario

On a night he’ll never forget, Frank Leboeuf had the massive task of marking Ronaldo Nazario at the 1998 FIFA World Cup final.

Showcasing his class, the Frenchman kept the Brazilian quiet, with his side eventually lifting the trophy following a 3-0 victory. And now, he’s opened up about that career-defining match.

During an exclusive interview with Sporf, via World Cup Betting he reminisced: “That was big pressure because I wasn’t supposed to play. I came in for Laurent Blanc because he was red-carded in the semi-final, and before the World Cup Aimé Jacquet told me that if Blanc or Marcel Desailly were injured or suspended I would play. So, I was ready.

“I knew that if we lost, it would’ve been because of me, ‘Frank Lebouef is not a big player’. They didn’t know anything about me and what I was achieving at Chelsea. The pressure helped me to be better.

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He continued: “I wasn’t only marking Ronaldo, because the Brazilian players knew Desailly and Lilian Thuram, so they were coming towards me. I had Rivaldo, Bebeto. I had a piece of them every ten minutes. When you play with Fabian Barthez, and Thuram at the back, Desailly in front of you, you have Emmanuel Petit, Didier Deschamps, Patrick Vieira, everybody works hard and were so talented, and I’d played with them so many times, that I knew what I was capable of doing.

“I was stressed about the result, not by my performance. On top of it, in 1998, I’d won the FA Cup with Chelsea and we won the UEFA Cup Winners Cup against Stuttgart, so I was in a phase where everything was positive and enjoyable. I never wondered during that time whether I was good enough to be in that position. I was working for the Times, and I wrote an article saying, ‘Don’t worry, we’re going to win the World Cup’.

“It was like 1966 in England, playing against the team you hate the most. For you, it was Germany; for us it was Brazil. It was the perfect night. People every single day, they don’t say ‘Well done’, they say, ‘Thank you’. I think it was the same for England.”