Stephen A. Smith has built a career on speaking confidently across the sports world, but his latest World Cup comment about France gave soccer fans an easy target.
The ESPN analyst was discussing France during the 2026 World Cup after Didier Deschamps’ side opened with a 3-1 win over Senegal.
France looked like one of the early tournament favorites again, but Smith’s wording made it sound as if the national team were still chasing a breakthrough that had never arrived. That is where the backlash began.
Stephen A. Smith gets France World Cup history badly wrong
The clip shared by Awful Announcing on X showed Smith asking a question that immediately confused soccer fans.
“I’m wondering what France is going to do, could this be the year that they finally get it done and they win the World Cup?” Smith said.
The problem is that France have already got it done recently. They won the 2018 World Cup in Russia, beating Croatia 4-2 in the final, and then reached another final in 2022 before losing to Argentina on penalties after a 3-3 draw.
France also won the World Cup in 1998, meaning they are not a country waiting for a first title. In the current era, they have been one of the strongest tournament teams in international soccer, with Kylian Mbappe central to both their 2018 triumph and their 2022 run.
That made Smith’s use of “finally” difficult to defend. France are trying to win another World Cup in 2026, not prove that they can win one for the first time.
Fans rip Stephen A. Smith over France comment
The reaction online was immediate and blunt, with many fans arguing that Smith’s comment showed exactly why soccer coverage needs people who know the sport’s basic history.
One fan wrote, “He’s such a g______ moron. He’s always been a moron.” Another said, “He can b_______ NBA topics but not soccer.”
Others focused on how far off the comment sounded for a World Cup discussion. One reaction read, “Stephen A probably thinks the World Cup happens every year.”
The criticism also turned toward the wider sports media landscape. One fan wrote, “That this guy gets paid millions of dollars a year to talk sports is a total indictment of the sports media industry.”
Another summed up the frustration by saying, “This is the thing about Stephen A., let him talk about basketball. He’s embarrassing when he steps out.”
Smith does not need to be a lifelong soccer voice to discuss the World Cup, but France’s recent history is not obscure. That is why the clip spread so quickly, and why the response from fans was so unforgiving.
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