Ahead of the group D opener, the France manager has claimed that his side will not go into the match as favourites and the Three Lions have same chances of winning the match as Les Bleus
Laurent Blanc has stressed that France are not the team they were 10 years ago and the coach does not believe that Les Bleus are clear favourites against England in their opening match of Euro 2012.
Despite on a 21-game unbeaten run, the France coach has dismissed his team’s chances of even qualifying. Blanc has refused to comment on the question of where his team stands and believes that France are outsiders in the competition.
However, after such an impressive build up to the Euros, the confidence of Les Bleus is very high and players are eagerly looking forward to a mouth-watering encounter against http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/England-c749. Especially after the disastrous 2010 world cup campaign, where France
were knocked out of the tournament in group stages; players want to perform well and win over the fans.
According to Laurent Blanc, http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/France-c2899 are still not on the same level with the likes of Spain or Germany and Les Bleus have a long way to go to achieve that status.
“The French team don’t have the same ambitions as http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Germany-c2904 at the start of these European Championships.”
Despite performing decently well in recent years, Head coach does not consider that France have retained their place in European or World football.
“France, in terms of their results over the last few years, have not allowed us to retain our place in European or world football.”
On a question of guiding Les Bleus to this level and France being clear favourites in the group, Blanc denied that. The Frenchman stressed that his side have a lot of hard work to do to achieve the heights they possessed 10 years ago when they won the world
cup in 1998 and European Championship in 2002.
“People say I often bring this up, but I don’t do that because I like to. It’s the reality. People say we’re favourites in the group, but I don’t agree with that.
“We are at the same level as the other sides. We hope to get through and justify our status.”
Laurent Banc expressed his satisfaction over his team’s progress and stressed that France are taking things slowly, step by step, and the players have performed well and Les Bleus deserved to be here where they are now.
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