France coach Laurent Blanc on Monday expressed his dismay that the new multi-million euro France kit unveiled on Monday makes Les Bleus look too much like their Italian rivals.

“I find that the completely blue jersey is beautiful but a bit Italian,” said Blanc after US sports apparel giants Nike unveiled the new kit in Paris.

“We know that the French are very attached to the blue-white-red. I made this remark but there’s a clever thing on the sleeve that you can lift up and that’s red inside.

“Afterwards it’s a question of consistency and uniformity. It will be up to the players to decide if we lift up the sleeves or not.

“In any case when we play in blue we’ll have white shorts and red socks so the blue-white-red will be visible.”

Nike have agreed a record annual 42.6 million euro contract with the French football federation (FFF) until 2018 which brings an end to the 38-year era of German rivals Adidas (1972-2010).

Nike have completely broken with the Adidas era opting for a very refined totally blue jersey — between dark and light blue - the red motifs have disappeared with only the FFF emblem and the Nike logo in white.