Nearly two decades after his career ended, Zinedine Zidane enjoys unparalleled popularity, which still makes him one of the French people’s favorite sportsmen. Criticizing the former playmaker is most often considered a crime of lèse-majesté and Noël le Graët was the victim of this a year ago, his acerbic remarks about the Marseillais precipitating his departure from the French Federation.
His former teammates generally have nothing but good things to say about the 1998 Ballon d’Or winner, whether at club or national level. Emmanuel Petit is therefore an exception. Because the former Gunner did not hesitate, in his autobiography A fleur de peau, to attack Zizou, accusing him of not investing enough in light of his status.
“Who is he making fun of?”
“Zidane is the absolute icon! Sure, he does some charitable work, but it’s far from enough compared to his considerable power. He needs to expose himself more,”
he wrote, drawing a bitter response from the former Bordeaux resident. “I told him what I thought, quite simply. I did it in private and not in the press. I don’t want to see him anymore,” he said in the columns of L’Equipe.
“I’ve already met him. I told him what I had to tell him. What’s he doing today, Little One? Who’s he making fun of? We see him everywhere, he had added. You shouldn’t take people for idiots. What annoys me is that I’ve met these people several times and they haven’t said anything to me. And then they spill the beans! I say no.”
Years later, Emmanuel Petit, who ZZ had asked to retract his remarks, explained that he regretted his statement. “If I had to do it again, I wouldn’t do it. Because the notion of team is more important than me. This group deserves to be protected, he confided in 2021. The social dimension and the emotional that all people give us every day, it’s crazy. We don’t have the right. I don’t have the right.”
