Bernard Diomède is one of the fifteen French players who passed by the Liverpool FC, like Ibrahima Konaté and the former international Mamadou Sakho, Aly Cissokho, Alou Diarra, Jean-Michel Ferri, Florent Sinama-Pongolle, Djibril Cissé and Nicolas Anelka. But the winger trained at AJ Auxerre is obviously the only one in the list to have won the World Cup with the French team, in 1998. French champion in 1996 and Stéphane Guivarc'h attack, “Little Bonhomme”as he is nicknamed by Aimé Jacquet in Eyes in the Bluesstarted two group matches as well as the eighth finals against Paraguay (he forced José Luis Chilavert to a parade at the start of the match).
World champion at 24, Diomède asked to leave Aja but Guy Roux, his mentor, said no. The native of Saint-Doulchard (Cher) was finally recruited by Gérard Houiller in Liverpool in 2000 against 4 million euros. “Gérard gives me coming. I had a discussion with loved, I wanted to go to Spain, loved to me: 'Liverpool, it's still good, it's a magic club'I said to myself: 'You can't help Liverpool with a French coach »»says the current coach of the French U20 team to
France Bleu.
Diomède made the misery in Carragher
The adventure on the banks of the Mersey does not go as planned. Diomedes only played five matches in all competitions in two and a half years, due to strong competition in the offensive sector. Michael Owen, Emile Heskey and Robbie Fowler were playing in front, Jari Litmanen, Vladimir Smicer, Patrik Berger and a certain Steven Gerrard below. “Gérard appreciated me, but at equal level, he put an Englishman. It was difficult because I stayed because I thought I was better than some. I had (Jamie) Carragher in marking, I manage to make him misery, I tell myself that if I am good in training, there is chances that I play ”he explains. An injury to the meniscus in the first season dismissed him from the rotation and he only played a preliminary tour of the Champions League the following season (against a Finnish club).
In this little sports nightmare, Bernard Diomède did not become a premier league player but another man. “I was in Liverpool for three years, it is also one of my best memories. A Auxerre (at the training center, editor's note)you leave at home at the age of 14. But Liverpool, you leave everything, your family, France. It is a first abroad, you grow humanly. The man I have become grew up in Liverpool ”testifies to the one who then relaunched himself to Ajaccio in Ligue 1, under the leadership of Roland Courbis (who already wanted him to OM before), before ending his career in Créteil and Clermont in the second division.
