Another les Bleus game, another pointless friendly you might say. Well Sunday night’s Stade de France encounter with Belgium proved just how entertaining an end of season friendly can be (Ireland and England take note!!). The Red Devils demonstrated just why they are now ranked second in the world with a comfortable display, despite what the 3-4 scoreline will show.

The defeat, Didier Deschamps’ second consecutive loss in Paris, certainly raised more questions than it answered. Chief amongst those was the performances of several players who seem to have established an automatic call up to the squad, despite their form for les Bleus.

In defence, there can be no real questions regarding Hugo Lloris who, although he perhaps could have done better with Radja Nainggolan’s shot, couldn’t really be held accountable for the other goals.

Both full backs, Bacary Sagna and Benoit Tremoulinas, didn’t really look settled and although the Sevilla left back improved in the second half, he should almost certainly not have been on the pitch after a dreadful foul on Dries Mertens. Concerns will be raised over these positions as outside those two, the options are pretty limited.

At right back there is the injury-prone Mathieu Debuchy and Lyon’s Christophe Jallet, who is now the wrong side of 30. Whilst there are more options at left back, the decline of Lucas Digne, the age of Tremoulinas and the little experience of Layvin Kurzawa throw more question marks on why Deschamps has persisted with Patrice Evra for quite so long.

Of equal, if not more worry last night, was the centre back pairing of Raphael Varane and Laurent Koscielny. Whilst the talent of Varane is indisputable, there can be no denying that he is currently suffering a loss of form. He certainly looks a more accomplished defender when paired with Mamadou Sakho.

Koscielny is one of those players who may perform well at club level but doesn’t seem quite able to cut it on the international stage. It has certainly been some time since he has looked comfortable in a France shirt and with his wayward positioning and unwanted ability to concede a penalty, as demonstrated last night (the third that he has conceded for France), perhaps another alternative needs to be considered prior to Euro 2016 – Samuel Umtiti maybe?

In midfield there was a shortcoming in the creativity department and even with Blaise Matuidi in the team, a real lack of energy. These are professional footballers, so it is hard to buy into the “end of a long season” excuse; just look at the Belgian players (who have a qualifier coming up next week) on display last night – full of running.

Quite how Yohan Cabaye keeps his place in Deschamps’ squad is baffling. It has been many moons since he last did something to justify a continued call up. The only real thing of note that Cabaye contributed last night was to add his name to that of Tremoulinas in the “could have been sent off” category, getting away with a yellow card for a foul on Hazard when the last man. It is a shame as there was a period when he did offer creativity, leadership and experience to the team, but with his lack of playing time at PSG having such a negative effect on his on-field abilities, the time has come to move on from the former Newcastle United man.

With the likes of Maxime Gonalons, Geoffrey Kondgobia and Morgan Schneiderlin at Deschamps’ disposal before Euro 2016, there are plenty of players who are more deserving of a place ahead of Cabaye.

One final area of negativity before we move on to the positive stuff and that was the forward line last night. Mathieu Valbuena was just as you expect: hard-working and certainly at times in the first half France’s only glimmer of hope.

Antoine Griezmann is starting to be something of an enigma. Hugely talented in La Liga for Athletico Madrid, it is frustrating to see him struggle to bring that form into the national team. Too often he disappears and last night he struggled to combine effectively with Olivier Giroud. Talking of the Arsenal forward, it was another poor evening for Giroud who just did not look up for the fight – although one can’t expect him to do too much without effective service. He wasn’t helped by the fact that France as a unit were poor going forward. It was a sad reflection of his current international form that he was so resoundingly booed as he left the pitch last night.

Giroud’s exit from the game does bring us on to the positives to take from defeat. By positives, we mean of course the introduction of the substitutes. There were four changes made during the game by Deschamps with each one making France more of an attacking threat.

Dimitri Payet came on at the break and instantly demonstrated why he topped the assist rankings in Ligue 1 with a lovely ball over the Belgian defence for Giroud. Payet found himself on the scoresheet with a well taken goal late in the game and generally looked to thrive in a playmaker role. Ligue 1 topscorer Alexandre Lacazette came on for Griezmann at half time but frustratingly for fans of the domestic game, saw him deployed out on the wing. Although he started his career there, it has been at centre forward where he has blossomed so he was never going to give the best account of himself there.

It was only when Paul-Georges Ntep came on for his debut – replacing Giroud – that Lacazette could revert to his natural role. Ntep certainly had a debut to remember as with only 10 minutes to shine, he gave a strong account of himself and even produced an assist, if somewhat fortuitously. Nabil Fekir was the beneficiary of that assist as he opened his goalscoring account for les Bleus and also looked dangerous with only limited time on the field.

With a trip to Albania to come on Saturday, it is time for Deschamps to up the ante and ask some questions of the more senior players who have taken their foot off the accelerator lately.

Why not play a front four of Payet, Fekir, Ntep and Lacazette? Why not start with Kondogbia (who missed last night’s match due to the birth of his son)? Why not build the partnership of Varane and Sakho? As we said at the start, more questions have been raised than answered. If the result of the defeat on Sunday night is that it leads to Deschamps shaking things up then perhaps we have something to thank Marc Wilmots and his Diables Rouges for!