Very critical with the 1998 world champions, Patrice Evra is particularly angry with Bixente Lizarazu.
Patrice Evra will have taken the time. But if he waited almost a month to deliver his feelings on the performance of the Blues at the World Cup, the former left side was particularly incisive. The native of Dakar, however, appreciated the performance of the Blues and said he was convinced that a bright future awaits the French team. But the former Mancunian did not digest the forced exit of Karim Benzema. And even more than the decision of Didier Deschamps to leave the Madrid after his thigh injury, it is the attitude of the Blues towards him that the player with 81 caps did not like.
” I’ve been disappointed “, he thus launched, adding: “I have the impression that Karim (Benzema) was disturbing. It bothers a lot of people. You players, for not supporting him, that’s what hurts me… We’re going to war for a player, guys. » And Patrice Evra to make the connection with what he experienced when he arrived at the Blues, just a few years after the coronation of July 12, 1998. “You are making the same mistake as the 98 world champions. Because they thought that since they had been world champions, the France team belonged to them, he explained. You want to decide who comes, who stays, who comes, no, you’re going to make the same mistake, you don’t need that. »
He never greeted me
The words of Patrice Evra are an obvious reference to the reception that Bixente Lizarazu had given him in particular during his first steps with the Blues. The Basque had hardly tasted the words of Thierry Henry, presenting him as the “new left back of the France team”. “I know Liza tried to lie by saying that we never had a selection together. Jérôme (Rothen) can attest to this, it was just before the Champions League final. And then Thierry (Henry), when I had never seen Lizarazu, told him that the next generation was there, he said last year at the microphone of RMC. Liza gives me a look and says, “Did you hear I retired? I arrived, I said hello to him, he never greeted me. I have no problem with Liza. In addition, we play the same position, and I really respect his enormous career in the France team or in a club with Bayern. But now, Thierry made a joke in bad taste. It established… after that, I never talked to Liza. »
And the problem was not limited to Bixente Lizarazu. “He was taking care of himself and Jérôme arrived to say hello to him. Zizou didn’t even calculate it! (Laughs). I thought to myself, “Welcome! “. It’s true that they were wicked”he recalled, adding: “There was a side to them: “We are the France team, and there is no place for you”. »
