France 1 Belgium 2

World Cup holders France showed the wear and tear of a long season to lose 2-1 to Belgium in a Paris friendly.

Belgian captain Marc Wilmots scored an injury-time winner to make the first major dent in the French aura of confidence leading into what promises to be an extremely tough title defence.

Wilmots produced a great solo effort to stun the French but Belgium fully deserved the win after a tired performance from the home team.

Dragging themselves through yet another friendly proved too tough despite a god showing on his debut from Auxerre top scorer Djibril Cisse but the real action starts in 13 days and the French will need a significant improvement in the opening game against Senegal on May 31st.

Wilmots helped Belgian confidence by slamming a rising drive past Ulrich Rame in the French goal.

France even had some help to get back on terms when Timmy Simons scored a 40th minute own goal after defender Glen De Boek had met a free kick on the blind side of the defence in the 20th minute to give Belgium a lead.

Frank Leboeuf put Simons off as he tried to clear a cross just before the interval and the ball glanced into his own net.

Second half substitute Cisse hit the bar with a header in the 70th minute and he looked a threat as one unknown option for France coach Roger Lemerre to use. The rest of the French squad have been through a lot in the last four years and they looked tired ahead of a major new hurdle.

But France can point to the absence of Thierry Henry and Zinedine Zidane with Christophe Dugarry and Youri Djorkaeff used in their place as one reason for their poor display.

David Trezeguet and Sylvain Wiltord both came close at the start of the game but the French were very lucky when Lilian Thuram was not punished for handballing a cross on 16 minutes.

France captain Marcel Desailly was cut on the cheek after being elbowed by Wesley Sonk after the break in a nasty incident that could have seen the striker red carded but everything went wrong for France in this friendly and they will feel better it happens now than in two weeks in Seoul.