PARIS, Jan 1 — The players in France’s football team which last year won the World Cup, today were awarded the Legion of Honour in the new year’s honours list.

The 23 players, including star strikers Kylian Mbappe and Antoine Griezmann, each received France’s top medal for their part in beating Croatia in the World Cup final in Moscow.

The French team that won the 1998 World Cup also received the Legion of Honour.

A total of 402 people — half men, half women — were on this year’s list, including French writer Michel Houellebecq, whose latest book Sérotonin is to be published later this month.

Houellebecq became a pin-up of France’s far right after publishing Submission, with its vision of a France subject to Shariah law after electing a Muslim president in 2022.

Others included Marin Sauvageon, a student who was badly beaten up in Lyon in November 2016 after standing up to a gang that was insulting a kissing couple. — AFP