As hosts the pressure will be on France, but we should expect them to reach the semi-finals. That’s the minimum I expect, particularly a team as talented as this French side.

The pressure may be on them to perform as hosts but I think the team should have all the support and sometimes that makes a huge difference. The team has been doing well for quite some time. They have beaten world champions Germany, Portugal and the Netherlands in the last year after a difficult period, especially when they lost 1-0 to Albania last June.

But they have won seven of their last eight games, the only loss coming against England in November, so overall I think the team has a good chance to perform well. With Didier Deschamps in charge he is the right man to lead them to that last four stage at least.

The tournament is at home and if you take the players individually, from goalkeeper Hugo Lloris to strikers Olivier Giroud and Antoine Griezmann, they should be good enough to achieve this. Obviously, Karim Benzema will not feature but we should be there around the end of the tournament. One man I’m hugely excited about is a player at my former club, Manchester United, who has played his way into selection after a superb debut Premier League season – Anthony Martial.

I didn’t know that much about him before this season to be honest. But he’s made a great start with all the pressure and attention on him, the amount of money the club had to spend to bring him in at the last minute, and being a number nine, even though he plays out wide mostly. He’s coped well with all this and his response on the pitch has been perfect. Like the rest of the team he’s had a dip in form but I think that was down to the team instead of himself, and now he’s back to his best again in time for the Euros.

As he was relatively new to me as a player I couldn’t really get much of an assessment on him, I was just curious to see whether he was going to be able to make any impact at Old Trafford and he’s done really well. He’s a typical modern striker so you would expect him to play on both flanks and centrally.

He’s going to grow into both the United and France squads and take on more importance. He’s done well in his first season, but he will be judged even harder in the second season and also the defenders will know more about him, his abilities, his tendancies, his decision making and his tricks.

If he’s a good player he will have an okay season, if he’s a great player he will have a great season.

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