France v Albania: Thomas Giles’s betting tip

France were understandably nervous in their first game against Romania as the pressure was on for the them to win due to being both hosts and tournament favourites. Their performance was far from convincing but they managed to scrape a 2-1 victory, the sign of potential champions. Albania lost 1-0 against Switzerland in one of the more intriguing match-ups of the first round of fixtures due to the many ethnic Albanian players in the Swiss squad. Gianni De Biasi’s side must get something out of this game to have any real chance of qualifying from the group stages.

Didier Deschamps’s men will surely put in a more convincing performance during their second game and should create lots of chances against an Albanian side who are missing influential captain Lorik Cana after he stupidly got sent off against the Swiss.

Once again there is no value in backing France so you need to look elsewhere to find anything worth putting money on. Goalscorers are generally a good option and Olivier Giroud is in good form for his country at the moment after finding the back of the net in the opener last week as well as in the pre-tournament friendlies. France are likely to create a lot of chances for the Arsenal man to score so you could back him to score any time at 21/20. However, I prefer something with a better return so have gone with Giroud to score a header at 7/2. I can see Albania conceding a lot of free kicks and corners so, with Dmitri Payet able to put in excellent deliveries, Giroud is likely to have some headed chances which you would expect him to convert.

See more Euro 2016 tips here.