French crowd to sing God Save the Queen

A year and a half after the crowd at Wembley marked the Paris terror attacks, the crowd at tonight’s France-England game at Stade de France will pay homage to the victims of the Manchester and London attacks.

French player Blaise Matuidi – who was playing for France in November 2015 as bombs went off outside the stadium – spoke at the press conference and asked that the crowd join in singing God Save the Queen before the friendly. He said “the country deserves it, especially with what has happened recently”.

The Wembley crowd had sung the Marseillaise in 2015, just four days after the Paris attacks, and it was played at grounds round the country the next weekend.

Tonight the teams will run on to the pitch to the sound of the Oasis song Don’t Look Back in Anger, played by the Garde Républicaine, which became symbolic in the aftermath of the Manchester attacks.

The French football federation said the protocol for the anthems would be changed so that the Marseillaise would be sung first and then the words of the British anthem shown on the stadium’s giant screens for the crowd to sing.

The anthems will be followed by a minute’s silence.

President Macron – an Olympique Marseille fan – will be joined at the game by prime minister Theresa May.