Arsene Wenger has never really shown much interest in packing in the day-to-day duties of club management for a more sedate life as a national team manager but he has admitted in the past that he would like to manage at the World Cup.

“Maybe, yes, I will do it at some stage but until now I like to be involved every day in the life of a club because the real test is there. Four or five weeks is a different experience, it’s more concentrated, but I believe the real experience of managing a team is on a daily basis,” Wenger said back in November when asked about the possibility of moving into international management.

“I will [always] be in football. I don’t know [if] as a director, as a manager – as long as possible as a manager. But one day that will stop. But I will stay in football, of course.”

Didier Deschamps will guide France in Russia this summer and has a wealth of talent available to win the tournament. Paul Pogba, N’Golo Kante, Antoine Griezmann, Thomas Lemar, Alexandre Lacazette, and Kylian Mbappé are just some of the names he has to call on.

That being said, France struggled somewhat in qualifying, losing to Sweden and drawing with Belarus and Luxembourg but they should make it out of their World Cup group (Australia, Peru, Denmark) with little drama and expectations are high in the country.

Deschamps has won more matches for France than any other manager but if they fail to rock the competition this summer with Arsene Wenger available, it’s not hard to imagine the FFF pushing for the Arsenal manager once again.

So would Wenger like to manage France at Qatar in 2022? “Maybe, you never know,” he said in November.

Of course, he couldn’t do that if he decides to…