Led in the first period, the Blues turned the situation around to obtain an essential victory for their maintenance among the elite, after being drafted there.

When they entered the competition, France had suffered an honorable defeat (4-2) against Slovakia, bronze medalist at the Beijing Games.

Initially absent from the Mondial-2022, France benefited in the same way as Austria from the exclusion of Russia and Belarus after the invasion of Ukraine.

To avoid relegation, France (currently 6th) must avoid eighth and last place in the group which includes the Canadians, reigning world champions.

During the first period, the Kazakhs opened the scoring with a 3 against 2 concluded by the skate of Valeri Orekhov (5th).

The Blues equalized in the second period thanks to their only NHL player present, Alexandre Texier, in the absence of executives Antoine Roussel, Pierre-Antoine Bellemare and Stéphane Da Costa.

They then took the lead in the second period thanks to a shot from Florian Chakiashvili diverted by a Kazakh who deceived his own goalkeeper.

The Blues will meet Germany on Monday (7:20 p.m.), before playing a crucial match on Wednesday against Italy (currently 7th).

© 2022 AFP