This is players’ chance for immortality...

EMMANUEL PETIT has warned France’s World Cup squad not to let their shot at immortality pass them by.

The former Arsenal and Chelsea midfielder was a key member of the squad when Les Bleus triumphed on home soil in 1998.

Petit played his part throughout the tournament, but particularly in the final. He provided the cross from which Zinedine Zidane scored the first of his two goals, before bagging the third himself to round off a 3-0 win over Brazil.

Two decades on, Petit and his pals are still feted for their achievements that summer. And he hopes that, in another 20 years, Antoine Griezmann, Kylian Mbappe, Olivier Giroud (right), Paul Pogba, N’golo Kante & Co are being venerated to the same degree.

Petit said: “It never stops, even this morning when I went to get the plane. People stop you every single time, they want to take a picture with you and it’s always the same word that comes up, ‘Merci!’ “I was talking with my former team-mates Bixente Lizarazu, Christophe Dugarry and Frank Leboeuf last week and we said we are still always surprised about what we receive from people every day. It has been 20 years and it’s like a tree giving fruit every single season – it’s amazing. So the message I would send to this group of players if I was manager is, ‘You have the opportunity to make history – take it’.” Petit certainly did.

And he added: “Scoring in the final is the cherry on the cake.

“I was not formed to score and not supposed to score goals.

“When you lift the trophy and when you score in the final, you have the feeling that you are the centre of the world, that you have