Mikael Silvestre believes that France have a great deal more success of bringing young players through than England simply because their youngsters are afforded game time at the top level.
France have seen a raft of talented youngsters break into Ligue 1 teams in recent years, with Paris Saint-Germain striker Kylian Mbappe and Barcelona’s Ousmane Dembele just two of the players to have flourished in the top flight before rapidly establishing themselves as world stars.
While the former Arsenal and Manchester United defender also pointed to the quality of academies in his homeland, he feels that the defining difference between the nations is how they are able to integrate their young players into their squads.
"In France, when young players reach 18 or 19 they can play in Ligue 1," Silvestre told Goal.
"In the Premier League, they have no chance to play in the first team before they reach 22-23. They go on loan here, they go on loan there and there's no space for them in the first team.
"In France, they have this opportunity to play first-team football. So they can keep growing. They play for the reserves early on and they carry on and play for the first team.
"Every league club has a performing academy and that is the number one reason. What you have in France is the possibility to play in Ligue 1. Therefore their progression becomes faster. The national team, therefore, has the benefit of picking a lot of youngsters.
"I think we have always had a lot of youngsters coming through in France. The academy and coaching system is very good. You had Tiemoue Bakayoko who went to Monaco and then to Chelsea. Then Dembele who is now at Barcelona and Mbappe.”
Despite this, he does not necessarily see France as one of the overwhelming favourites to achieve success at the World Cup in Russia next summer.
"France are one of the favourites? Why not? Still, there is the question of philosophy or style of play," he said. "Sometimes we don't perform because I think we are lacking a blueprint or strong identity.
"We won't be able to find the answer [like during the loss to Sweden in June]. Our collective performance is sometimes not good as individual performances. We have to improve on that aspect."