PARIS -- With the European Championship title at stake, France coach Didier Deschamps must decide whether to take the game to Portugal on Sunday or stick with the counter-attacking style that worked well against Germany in their semifinal.

France has developed into an opportunist side at Euro 2016 with a penchant for hitting teams on the break. It no longer has an inspirational playmaker like Zinedine Zidane orchestrating attacks, and responds better to how others play, rather than dictating the game.

"It's not because we're at home that we've got any extra strengths," Deschamps said after Thursday's 2-0 win against Germany, giving an insight into his side's more pragmatic style of play.

France's only truly dominant performance of the tournament was a 5-2 win against Iceland in the quarterfinals, but in that game Iceland's rigid 4-4-2 formation posed few problems. Otherwise, France's strength is more for winning through sheer persistence.

In order to extract the most from his players, Deschamps has been flexible in his coaching, switching between 4-3-3 and 4-2-3-1 formations and changing his lineup several times.

The problem is that Portugal likes to grind teams down, patiently waiting for the moment to pick out a run from Cristiano Ronaldo.

While the Germans played very high up, with goalkeeper Manuel Neuer at times standing near the halfway line, Portugal sits very deep and leaves far less gaps to expose. Sunday's final could therefore become a possession-based duel, which may not suit France.

Unless Deschamps makes changes.

Les Bleus will need to improve its use of the ball against Portugal, and this could lead to Deschamps bringing N'Golo Kante back into the side at the expense of Moussa Sissoko, who wasted good attacking positions against Germany with some sloppy passes.

Kante's presence in a 4-3-3 offers a quick outlet for the centre backs, and his tidy passing helps gain quick forward momentum. The formation also offers more width and better suits Dimitri Payet -- who has faded since making a strong start to Euro 2016.

France's most creative midfielder, who has scored three goals so far, struggled to make an impression against Germany other than for his glaring inability to track back and defend.

Deschamps will overlook this because he needs Payet to exploit any holes in Portugal's tight unit.

With a tournament-leading six goals so far, Antoine Griezmann is clearly France's main threat in attack. He caused Germany problems by drifting between their lines, making it hard to pick him up. When German players got close, he used his excellent touch to play quick one-twos.

That was important because striker Olivier Giroud's hold-up play was patchy and he gave the ball away too often.

Giroud will need to improve against Portugal, as will France's defence, which remains too static at times against strong passing sides.