France Football - La Bible du Foot

La Bible du Foot: The Story of France Football Magazine and the Men Who Crown Kings.

The Golden Ink: How a French Magazine Shaped the World's Football Imagination 

For 80 years, France Football Magazine has done more than report on the game, it has created its most coveted prize, chronicled the souls of champions, and inspired a global family of publications that share its vision. This is the story of a magazine that turned journalism into legend and sparked a tradition that now circles the earth.

Prologue: The Night the Ball Turned Gold

The Théâtre du Châtelet sits on the Right Bank, its chandeliers casting warm light onto the cobblestones of the Place du Châtelet. On the second last Monday of September 2025, the theatre breathes differently. Men in black tie and women in gowns climb the marble steps. Camera flashes detonate in the November chill. Inside, 1,500 guests wait.

On stage, a golden sphere rests on a velvet cushion. It catches the light, throws it back, demands attention. It is smaller than a football, heavier, impossibly precious. For 69 years, this object, designed by a Parisian jeweller, dreamed up by French journalists has been the most coveted individual prize in world sport.

Ousmane Dembélé, 28 years old, born in Vernon, raised in the banlieues, shaped by the streets, accepts it. He kisses it. He holds it above his head. The crowd rises.

Didier Deschamps, who lifted the World Cup as captain in 1998 and as manager in 2018, watches from the wings. A microphone finds him. He says: "C'est aussi un succès pour la France." It's also a success for France.

Behind the ceremony, behind the golden sphere itself, stands an institution that every French football fan has known since childhood. An institution that, for eight decades, has occupied a sacred place in the rituals of French life the weekly visit to the kiosque, the rustle of glossy pages, the smell of fresh ink, the arguments and debates that spilled into Monday mornings across the country.

France Football magazine. A monthly publication from the Groupe Amaury, based in a discreet building in Boulogne-Billancourt, with a circulation that once topped half a million and now holds steady at 71,306 copies each month, reaching more than a million readers. But numbers have never told the full story. The full story lives in memory: the fathers who brought it home on Thursday afternoons, the boys who devoured it before dinner, the generations of French men and later, women who learned to love football through its pages.

This is the story of that magazine. A story of French journalists who saw something deeper in the game and, in doing so, taught the world how to write about football.

Birth of a Bible (1946-1955)

The year is 1946. Europe is still rebuilding from war. In the rubble of cities, children kick footballs made of rags. In the offices of the Groupe Amaury on the outskirts of Paris, editors plan something new.

France has had football publications before. The first, simply called Football, appeared in 1927 as a semi-official organ of the French Football Federation. It was useful, informative, but never vital. Now, with peace returned, the moment feels different. The game is expanding. Professionalism in French football is taking root. There is appetite for something deeper.

The new magazine is christened France Football. Initially, it shares space with France Football Officiel, carrying every decision and measure adopted by the federation. It is, in those first months, a house journal as much as a newspaper. The first issue's editorial is written by Jules Rimet himself - the Frenchman who created the World Cup.

But on September 25, 1947—issue number 79 the magazine cuts the cord. It declares independence. From this moment, it will answer to no federation, no authority, no one but its readers.

The early editions are modest by today's standards. Printed on newsprint that yellows within weeks, black and white, photographs grainy and small. Yet they contain something revolutionary, a commitment to depth. While daily papers chase scoops, France Football pursues understanding. Long photographic reports that stretch across pages. Interviews that run for thousands of words, allowing players to speak in full sentences. Statistics compiled with the devotion of monks illuminating manuscripts.

For three decades, France Football shares resources with its sister publication, the daily sports newspaper L'Équipe. Journalists write for both: breaking news on Sunday night for L'Équipe, then longer reflections for France Football later in the week. The two publications, both owned by Groupe Amaury, work in harmony, one delivering immediacy, the other offering depth.

Two names echo through these early years: Jacques Ferran and Gabriel Hanot.

Hanot is already a legend. A former French international, he had played his last match before the war and turned to journalism with the same intensity he had brought to the pitch. Tall, severe, impossibly erudite, he writes with a moral authority that commands respect.

Ferran is younger, sharper, a man with vision. Together, they will change the game forever. In 1955, they conceive the European Champion Clubs' Cup the competition that will become the Champions League. The following year, they will create something even more enduring.

But first, they must build the magazine. Week by week, issue by issue, they cultivate a readership. They send reporters to every corner of France, then to every corner of Europe. They establish correspondents in cities most French people cannot locate on a map. They build a network.

The office hums with typewriters and cigarette smoke. Deadlines arrive with the regularity of tides. And somewhere, in the minds of its editors, an idea begins to form.

The Birth of the Golden Ball (1956)

The idea arrives in 1956, fully formed, like Athena from the head of Zeus.

European football is expanding. The European Cup, which Hanot and Ferran had helped create, is proving a success. Real Madrid, with Di Stéfano and Kopa, are enchanting the continent. But there is no individual prize to match the team trophies. No way to crown the king of Europe.

Ferran convenes his colleagues. They discuss, debate, refine. The concept is elegantly simple: each year, a panel of journalists from across Europe will vote for the best player on the continent. Points will be awarded, totals tallied, and a winner proclaimed. The prize will be a golden sphere, designed by the Parisian jeweller Mellerio dits Meller.

They call it the Ballon d'Or- the Golden Ball.

The first vote takes place in December 1956. Journalists from sixteen European nations submit their ballots. The winner, announced on December 18, is Stanley Matthews, the 41-year-old English winger who has just led Blackpool to the FA Cup final. Forty-seven points. Behind him, Alfredo Di Stéfano with 44. Third, a young Frenchman named Raymond Kopa, who plays for Real Madrid.

France has its first Ballon d'Or connection immediately. Kopa will win it himself the following year, the first of eight French victors to date.

The trophy's full name at inception reveals its ambition: "Trophée du footballeur européen de l'année à l'étranger" - European Footballer of the Year Abroad. The "abroad" qualifier acknowledges that the prize is for players based outside their home countries, a nuance that will soon fade. But the core idea is there: a panel of experts, a democratic vote, a golden reward.

In the offices, the editors allow themselves a moment of satisfaction. They have created something that will outlive them. They do not yet know how large it will become.

The Golden Age (1960s - 1980s) 

Through the 1960s and 1970s, France Football grows in lockstep with the sport it covers. The magazine moves from newsprint to glossy paper in February 1977, introducing colour covers and, gradually, colour interiors. The difference is transformative. Photographs that once seemed flat now pulse with life. The green of pitches, the red of shirts, the gold of the trophy itself all rendered in hues that make readers want to reach through the page.

Circulation explodes. From 100,000 copies in the 1970s to 213,000 by 2004. At its peak, after France's 1998 World Cup victory, it will sell 520,000 copies in a single issue.

This is the era when France Football becomes more than a magazine. It becomes an institution. Its reporters are granted access that others can only dream of. Its photographers capture images that define generations. Its writers craft prose that readers clip and save.

And every Thursday, across France, the ritual unfolded. The kiosque on the corner, its racks freshly stocked. The man in the blue work jacket stopping on his way home. The boy on his bicycle, coins clutched in his palm. The smell of ink and glossy paper. The weight of it in the hand. The promise of hours of pleasure.

In Lyon, a young Michel Platini reads about the heroes of Saint-Étienne and dreams of one day gracing those pages himself. In Marseille, a boy named Zinedine studies photographs of Enzo Francescoli, cutting them out, taping them to his wall. In Lens, in Nantes, in Bordeaux, in a thousand small towns across France, the same scene unfolds: fathers and sons, side by side, turning pages, arguing, dreaming.

The Ballon d'Or winners during these years read like a pantheon of European football: Eusébio (1965), Bobby Charlton (1966), Franz Beckenbauer (1972 and 1976), Johan Cruyff (1971, 1973, 1974), Kevin Keegan (1978, 1979), Karl-Heinz Rummenigge (1980, 1981). Each announcement brings new debate, new letters to the editor, new passion.

And then, in 1983, a Frenchman: Michel Platini of Juventus.

Platini wins again in 1984 and 1985 three consecutive Ballons d'Or, a feat matched only by Cruyff and van Basten. France has found its first footballing demigod, and France Football has the exclusive access to tell his story. The issue announcing his first victory sells out within hours. Copies are passed from hand to hand, read until the pages soften.

The magazine's reputation rests not only on the Ballon d'Or but on its journalism. In 2001, it publishes a bombshell investigation into French league passport fraud. The reporters have uncovered evidence that Nantes, Metz, and other clubs have been using ineligible foreign players, falsifying documents, bending rules. The revelations threaten to strip Nantes of their league title and relegate three clubs.

This is journalism with consequences—the kind that changes results, not just reports them. Lawyers are consulted. Threats are made. The magazine stands by its story.

The Global Expansion (1995-2016)

By the mid-1990s, football has outgrown Europe. The Champions League is a global brand, watched in every time zone. The World Cup draws viewers from every continent. The Ballon d'Or, still restricted to European players, risks becoming anachronistic.

In 1995, France Football makes a decision that will reshape the award forever. Henceforth, any player active at a European club regardless of nationality is eligible.

The first non-European winner is George Weah of Liberia, then starring for Milan. It is a moment of profound significance. Weah's story raised in the slums of Monrovia, discovered by Arsène Wenger at Monaco, developed into one of the world's finest strikers captures something essential about football's global reach. When he receives the trophy, tears in his eyes, he holds it for Liberia as much as for himself. He remains to this day the only African winner of the Ballon d'Or.

Two years later, Ronaldo of Brazil becomes the first South American winner. At 21, he is the youngest ever, a record that still stands. The floodgates are open.

In 2007, the award expands further. Henceforth, any player anywhere in the world regardless of nationality or club location is eligible. The Ballon d'Or has truly become a global prize.

The year 2010 brings a seismic shift. France Football merges the Ballon d'Or with FIFA's World Player of the Year award, creating the FIFA Ballon d'Or. The merger is orchestrated by Jérôme Valcke, a Frenchman and FIFA's secretary-general, who understands the value of aligning with the prestigious French brand.

For six years, the two organizations jointly present the prize. The winners during this period- Lionel Messi (four times), Cristiano Ronaldo (twice) are undisputed. But something is lost. The purity of the journalists-only vote is diluted by the inclusion of national team coaches and captains. The debate becomes noisier, less focused.

In 2016, the divorce is finalized. France Football takes back full ownership. The Ballon d'Or reverts to its roots - voted exclusively by journalists. FIFA launches its own "The Best" awards, which the football world regards as a lesser cousin—a trophy without the golden sphere.

Barrett, former international director of France Football, writes of the moment: "It is time for the Ballon d'Or to shine again. For 60 years, the Ballon d'Or has maintained its authority through continuous innovation. The independence is not just about separating from FIFA, but about new reforms."

The Family of Football Magazines

France Football's influence extends far beyond its own pages. Like a stone dropped in still water, its ripples have spread across the Channel and beyond, inspiring a network of football publications across Europe and the world.

World Soccer magazine, launched in London in 1960, stands as the most direct spiritual heir. Published today by TI Media, it specialized in the international football scene, bringing the world game to English-speaking readers. And for more than five decades, its defining voice belonged to Brian Glanville.

Glanville, who passed away in May 2025 at the age of 93, joined World Soccer soon after its first issue and contributed his monthly column for more than fifty years- an unbroken thread connecting generations of readers. His Olivetti Lettera, clacking away in press centres while others tapped quietly at laptops, became a symbol of something enduring: the belief that football writing could be literature.

His wit was legendary. The Premier League became the "Greed is Good League." Sepp Blatter had "50 ideas a day, 51 of them bad." But beneath the wit lay profound knowledge. Glanville was among the first British writers to take European football seriously, to pronounce Italian names correctly, to understand that the game existed beyond these shores. He served on the jury for the Ballon d'Or, his global perspective making him a natural arbiter of footballing excellence.

His book "The Story of the World Cup," first published in 1973 and regularly updated until his final years, became an essential text—a work that brought insight, knowledge and joy to fans everywhere.

In 1982, World Soccer launched its own annual awards: Player of the Year, Manager of the Year, Team of the Year. The echoes of France Football's Ballon d'Or were unmistakable. In 1999, World Soccer published a readers' poll listing the 100 greatest football players of the 20th century. France Football had done something similar the same year, polling all living Ballon d'Or winners to select Pelé as the century's best. The two magazines, operating independently, were engaged in the same essential project: chronicling greatness, building pantheons, helping readers understand who belonged among the immortals.

World Soccer is also a member of the European Sports Magazines (ESM) , an umbrella group of similar publications printed in different languages. Other members include Portugal's A Bola, Spain's Don Balón, Germany's Kicker, Italy's La Gazzetta dello Sport, and Russia's Sport Express. These publications, each a leader in its domestic market, together elect a European "Team of the Month" and "Team of the Year" - a tradition that echoes France Football's pan-European vision.

Other magazines have followed different paths. Spain's Don Balón, founded in 1975, became famous for its annual ranking of the 100 best players in the world. Italy's Guerin Sportivo, founded in 1912, is one of the oldest sports magazines in existence. Germany's Kicker, founded in 1920, combines match reports with exhaustive statistical analysis.

But all of them, in their own ways, owe a debt to France Football. It was the French magazine that first demonstrated that football journalism could be serious, could be literary, could be worthy of the same respect as political reporting or cultural criticism. And it was publications like World Soccer, and writers like Brian Glanville, who carried that flame across the Channel and into the English-speaking world.

The French Renaissance (1998-2018)

July 12, 1998. The Stade de France. Zinedine Zidane's two headers against Brazil. A nation explodes.

The next issue of France Football sells 520,000 copies- the highest in its history. Two days after the final, a nation desperate to relive the glory grabs the magazine from kiosks in record numbers. The cover photograph shows Zidane, arms raised, the trophy behind him. The headline is simple: "CHAMPIONS DU MONDE".

In every city, every town, every village, the queues form before dawn. The kiosquières work frantically, their hands raw from counting change, their voices hoarse from repeating "Oui, nous avons France Football, mais il faut faire la queue." By midday, the print run is exhausted. Copies are shared, passed from friend to friend, read aloud in cafés.

Zidane wins the Ballon d'Or that year, the fourth French winner. The magazine's offices receive letters from readers who have kept every issue since childhood, who now add this one to their collections. A man in Lille writes that he has every issue since 1962. A woman in Toulouse writes that her late husband collected them, and she wants the Zidane issue to complete his set.

In 2018, France Football expands its portfolio, creating three new prizes: the Ballon d'Or Féminin (for the world's best female player), the Kopa Trophy (for the best under-21 player), and the Yashin Trophy (for the best goalkeeper). The first winners: Ada Hegerberg, Kylian Mbappé, and Alisson Becker. The awards recognize positions and genders previously excluded from the golden conversation.

The Kopa Trophy, named for Raymond Kopa—the first French winner of the Ballon d'Or connects past and present. The Yashin Trophy, named for Lev Yashin the only goalkeeper ever to win the Ballon d'Or honours a position often overlooked.

These new awards reflect France Football's enduring philosophy: evolve or die. The magazine that created the Ballon d'Or in 1956, that opened it to non-Europeans in 1995, that globalized it in 2007, that broke from FIFA in 2016, this is a publication that understands that tradition and innovation must coexist.

The Intellectual Home

Beyond the glitz of the Ballon d'Or, France Football has always served a quieter but equally vital role: the intellectual home of French football writing. Its pages have hosted some of the most elegant prose ever penned about the game.

The most unexpected contributor? Albert Camus.

In 1957, the year Camus won the Nobel Prize for Literature, France Football invited him to write about his relationship with football. Camus, too busy with speaking engagements, declined but wrote a letter to editor Jacques Ferran that revealed his soul:

"I want to confirm to you that, even if I don't have time to write this piece, France Football attracts me much more than all the political commentary and newspapers."

Camus had been a goalkeeper in his youth for Racing Universitaire d'Alger (RUA), before tuberculosis ended his career at 17. His philosophy of life was shaped on the pitch. In 1953, writing for the RUA newsletter, he had composed the line that would become immortal:

"Of all the activities presented to me by the world, it is sport that taught me morality and responsibility."

He later changed "sport" to "football."

When Camus died in a car crash in January 1960, mourners at his funeral included members of a local youth football club, who draped a jersey over his coffin. France Football had lost its most illustrious fan.

The magazine's tradition of literary journalism continues today. Long-form investigations, exclusive interviews, cultural essays France Football remains committed to the idea that football deserves to be written about with the same care as literature or politics.

The Weight of Gold

What makes the Ballon d'Or different from other prizes? Why does it matter more?

Part of the answer lies in history. The award has existed since 1956, longer than any comparable individual prize. Part lies in the voting: journalists, not federations or players, decide. There is a perceived objectivity, even if the process remains inherently subjective.

But most of all, it matters because of the names engraved on it. Di Stéfano. Cruyff. Beckenbauer. Platini. Van Basten. Ronaldo. Messi. Cristiano. The list is a syllabus of football greatness. To join it is to enter a pantheon that no other prize can offer.

The magazine's own description of its criteria reflects the delicacy of the task: individual performances, team achievements, class and fair play. Critics call it a "popularity contest," biased toward attacking players. But popularity, in this context, is not trivial. To be popular among the most knowledgeable observers—journalists who watch football for a living—is its own kind of validation.

There is also the weight of the object itself. The golden sphere is small enough to hold in two hands, heavy enough to feel substantial. It is designed to be photographed, to be kissed, to be raised above heads in stadiums. It is a thing of beauty, and beauty matters.

The Archive and the Future

In Boulogne-Billancourt, on the southwestern edge of Paris, the archives of France Football contain nearly eight decades of football history. Every issue, every photograph, every statistic, every interview. The first Matthews profile, printed on newsprint that has yellowed to the colour of old bone. The Platini exclusives, with his signature across the cover. The Zidane specials, published in the white heat of 1998. The Messi and Ronaldo years, when the Ballon d'Or became a duopoly.

The building also contains the golden balls themselves—not the trophies (those go to the winners) but the memory of them, preserved in filing cabinets and hard drives.

What comes next is unclear. Print continues its slow decline. In 2021, France Football moved from weekly to monthly publication, a casualty of the COVID-19 pandemic and the broader shift to digital media. Fifty-six staff members lost their jobs. The magazine that once sold 520,000 copies now sells 71,306 each month.

But the brand endures. The Ballon d'Or ceremony, now co-organized with UEFA, remains a global event. The website, hosted within L'Équipe.fr, reaches millions. The special issues, profiling the nominees and winners, still sell out.

And yet, something has been lost. The Thursday ritual. The queue at the kiosque. The smell of fresh ink. The father handing the magazine to his son. The arguments in the schoolyard. The photographs cut out and taped to bedroom walls. These moments, once the fabric of French football life, have faded into memory.

But memory is powerful. And in a thousand homes across France, in attics and basements and bookshelves, the archives remain. Stacked in chronological order, spine cracked, pages yellowed, they wait. They are the proof of a life lived with football. They are the story of France.

Epilogue: The Next Page

The offices in Boulogne-Billancourt are quiet now. The typewriters have been replaced by screens, the cigarette smoke by filtered air. But the work continues. Journalists call contacts across Europe. Photographers edit images from the weekend's matches. Editors shape the next issue, the next story, the next chapter.

On a wall in the conference room, framed copies of every Ballon d'Or cover hang in chronological order. Matthews, 1956. Kopa, 1957. Di Stéfano, 1957 and 1959. Suárez, 1960. Sívori, 1961. Masopust, 1962. Yashin, 1963 the only goalkeeper ever to win.

The eye travels across decades. Law, Charlton, Eusébio. Best, Bobby Moore, Müller. Cruyff, Beckenbauer, Keegan. Rummenigge, Rossi, Platini. Belanov, Gullit, van Basten. Matthäus, Papin, Baggio. Stoichkov, Weah, Sammer. Ronaldo, Zidane, Rivaldo. Figo, Owen, Nedvěd. Shevchenko, Ronaldinho, Cannavaro. Kaká, Cristiano, Messi. Modrić, Benzema, Dembélé.

Sixty-nine names. Sixty-nine seasons. Sixty-nine stories.

The oldest framed cover, from 1956, shows Matthews in black and white, his hair slicked back, his expression serious. The newest, from 2025, shows Dembélé in full colour, the golden sphere gleaming, his arm raised in triumph.

Between them, the history of football. Between them, the story of France Football.

The magazine will publish its next issue next week. The Ballon d'Or will be awarded again next year. The journalists will argue, debate, vote. And somewhere, in a city that has not yet been named, a child will kick a ball against a wall and dream of one day holding the golden sphere.

Perhaps that child's father will buy him a copy of France Football. Perhaps they will read it together, side by side, the way fathers and sons have done for eighty years. Perhaps the ritual will endure after all.

That is the legacy. That is the magic. That is France Football.