France beat Austria 1-0 in their Euro 2024 Group D opener on Monday after Maximilian Wöber's own goal in the 38th minute settled a fairly even contest.
France coach Didier Deschamps racked up his 100th win in charge in Dusseldorf as he bids to become the first manager to win the men's World Cup and the Euros as both a player and coach.
Kylian Mbappé set up the goal but later went off with what could be a broken nose.
"Apparently the nose is not good at all," Deschamps told TF1. "So we’ll see. It’s obviously the negative point of the evening. Even if it’s just his nose it’s annoying for us."
Austria, seen as outsiders by some pundits given their strong form under Ralf Rangnick, had lost just one of their previous 16 games.
The Netherlands beat Poland 2-1 in the other group opener on Sunday. The French next face the Dutch on Friday when Austria take on Poland.
N'Golo Kanté started in his first competitive match for France in two years after his club career took him to Saudi Arabia while Mbappé captained Les Bleus at a tournament for the first time.
The World Cup runners-up had the first big chance through the lightning quick Mbappé, but goalkeeper Patrick Pentz turned the effort round the post.
As an intense first half wore on, Christoph Baumgartner almost scored for Austria and moments later Mbappé danced to the byline and crossed, with Wöber nodding in accidentally with his body position all wrong.
"The fact we conceded shortly after is bitter," Baumgartner told ARD of his big miss. "Brutally unlucky. We made chances and we have to keep going like this."
The second period started with Antoine Griezmann colliding with the advertising hoardings and suffering a large cut to his forehead. The France playmaker was able to continue and watch Mbappé miss a glorious chance on 55 minutes.
Austria captain Marcel Sabitzer had a shout for a penalty turned down as he played in a record eighth Euro game for his country but Austria could not force a leveller despite pushing - with man-of-the-match Kanté producing one superb last-ditch tackle.
Mbappé went off with blood pouring for his nose after a clash late on and was then booked for coming on the field before dropping to the floor again. He was then substituted and Deschamps will hope a possibly broken nose does not hamper his star going forward.
Rangnick could have left Austria for Bayern Munich but decided to stay put beyond these Euros and he said before kick off he stands by one of the most difficult decisions of his career.
The former RB Leipzig and Manchester United boss now has to rouse his side after they failed to match Slovakia, who pulled off the first shock of the tournament by beating Belgium 1-0 earlier on Monday.
France meanwhile will feel similar to fellow favourites England, who also edged their opener with Serbia 1-0. A win is a win but improvements will be needed as Les Bleus try to make fans forget political strife at home.
"I'm relieved, but also satisfied with the way my lads played. We could have made the breakthrough earlier. Collectively, my team played well. Sometimes we lacked a bit of precision," added Deschamps.
