sokkerluver
27 Jul 2004, 01:31 PM
After reaching 103 caps for France, (the second highest in French Football Federation history) Juventus defender Lilian Thuram has called it quits for France. More on :http://soccernet.espn.go.com/headlinenews?id=305640&cc=5901
Rima067
27 Jul 2004, 04:41 PM
I wonder what he meant here:
"Perhaps the result and the behaviour of some people on the pitch strengthened my decision.
http://skysports.planetfootball.com/article.asp?id=216127&cpid=219
Was he confirming what happened with Henry/Pires v Zidane...?
Danks81
28 Jul 2004, 09:01 AM
Was he confirming what happened with Henry/Pires v Zidane...?
What is this about?
Pierre-Henri
03 Aug 2004, 05:47 AM
There are always small feuds in a losing team.
In fact, the argument was of tactical nature : Pires and Henry stated that the team relied way too much on Zidane's play, and was unbalanced because of that (frankly, it's so obvious that it shouldn't even be a question).
In the Euro, Zidane played right wingman, a place he doesn't like. He prefers to be Central offensive midfielder (real number 10). Therefore, he was always shifting from the right side to Center field, wich resulted in an incredible tactical mess.
So, there's two way of considering the problem :
1) a player should play where the coach told him to play, even if it's a stupid choice (Henry, Pires).
2) When your coach has obviously lost his sense of reality, and put his best player in a uneasy situation, you try to bend the rules and make the best of it (Zidane).
The real culprit was Santini, of course, but he quit the team, so he doesn't care. I can't believe a Brit team was stupid enough to hire him.