French president Emmanuel Macron has said he will travel to watch the national team at the World Cup "when" they reach the semifinals.
Macron had lunch with the France squad at their training camp in Clairefontaine earlier this week, a presidential visit that has become a ritual for French leaders since Jacques Chirac visited the squad in the run-up to their 1998 World Cup triumph on home soil.
"I said I'd come to see you when you got through the quarterfinal. Note that I said 'when' and not 'if,'" Macron told the players.
"You're all huge stars. The French team has shone when it is united. But when egos have emerged, when there have been rifts, it didn't work out so well."
Speaking after Saturday's 1-1 friendly draw at home to the United States, forward Antoine Griezmann said: "I don't think we think too much of ourselves. We have our feet on the ground and we want to win.
"There is a good atmosphere and we might give the impression that we are showing off a bit, but that's not at all the case."
"We're calm, we have faith in ourselves and we know we still have work to do to be ready. The competition starts in a week and we'll be ready physically."
Speaking to the Telefoot programme on French channel TF1, Macron said: "I feel the team wants to succeed and bring back the cup."
The Marseille-supporting president also joked that he would not want to face the pressures of being national team coach.
"There are always 60 million people who believe they can do better than either [the coach or the president]," he told journalists before lunching with the squad. "That's why I'd never look to be the team coach."