Allez les Bleus le Bleu

While England were busy deferring the inevitable disappointment of failure until next summer, France had to settle for a World Cup play-off despite beating Finland 3-0. Dreamboat may have scored in the 6-0 rout of Australia, but he nevertheless found himself dropped to the bench like club colleague Loic Remy - the pair joining Moussa Sissoko as onlookers, with Mathieu Debuchy somewhat inexplicably our only representative in the French starting XI.

Both Dreamboat and Remy made second-half appearances, the latter hitting the post, though it was fellow substitute Karim Benzema who scored the third. The duo have been arguably our best performers so far this season, and we'll be desperate for them to report back for club duty fit and well ahead of Saturday's visit of Liverpool. For his part, Debuchy - who set up France's second goal and almost scored himself - will need to erase the memory of last season's fixture, which we lost 6-0 and during which he was red-carded...