France's player maker Zinedine Zidane said the Les Bleus just came back to life in time to beat World Cup holders Brazil 1-0 for a semifinal berth on Saturday.

"We needed a great match and we delivered. We knew we would have to be fit physically and we were," said the Real Madrid midfielder who produced a man-of-the-match display to inspire the team to victory and set up the decisive goal by Thierry Henry with a free-kick.

"We fought closely together for a well-deserved victory. Now we'll try to win a place in the final. We don't want to stop now. This is so beautiful, we want it to carry on," added Zidane, who's on the verge of retirement.

Henry echoed that the French side deserved the win with a strong performance.

"We played well. We didn't steal anything from anybody. We had a tactical plan and it worked perfectly," said the Arsenal striker who side-footed to send the ball into the top of the net in 57 minutes.

With the victory, the Frenchmen set up a semifinal clash against Portugal Wednesday in Munich after Luis Felipe Scolari's side won 3-1 on penalty shoot-out over England earlier the day in Gelsenkirchen.