Franck Ribery has said his Bundesliga club Bayern Munich is more important to him than the French national team ahead of this week’s friendly against Italy.

The 29-year-old is set to make his 70th appearance for Les Bleus on Wednesday in Parma, Italy, having been selected in Didier Deschamps’s squad, but his comments to German Sky Sports may take some of his countrymen by surprise.

“I have been at Bayern Munich for six years,” he said.

“Here it is always good, here I am happy and here it’s fun. That is more important for me than the national team.”

Ribery has courted controversy during his time at Bayern after it emerged in 2010 he had had sex with an under-age prostitute in a scandal which involved other members of the France team.

The former Marseille winger has been in superb recent form for Bayern, but admitted the German league leaders were jaded in Saturday’s 2-0 win over Eintracht Frankfurt having hammered Lille 6-1 in the Champions League last Wednesday.

Ribery says the relentless stream of Bundesliga, Champions League and German Cup matches are taking their toll on Bayern who have played two games a week for the last month.

“Playing every three days doesn’t make it easy, and that was the case here,” he said.

“Frankfurt were fresher, but we had lots of chances and should have taken the lead earlier.”