Take Us Off Paint Season 17 Episode 32 – 20 Minutes Productions
From our special correspondent in Budapest,
He is strong, valiant, quick and hardworking. Never has one word higher than the other, always says hello, does not apostrophe journalists. He dines with strangers in London after missing his Eurostar for Paris like everyone else and is reluctant to hire a cleaning lady because of his social background – a story recently told by Adil Rami on RMC. N’Golo Kanté would be a formidable object of propaganda under a communist regime, the worthy descendant of Stakhanov. Except that the joke has lasted long enough and that all this no longer pleases the French who, from the height of his 30 brooms, would finally like to be treated like an adult. It came out like a cry from the heart during a press conference in Clairefontaine before the Euro – even if it is true that it was a little tight.
“It’s true that sometimes you can have an image that is a little too beautiful, a little too pretty,” he said. But in the end, I’m just a normal person. There is no need to say that I am the nicest, the nicest. I’m just a gamer like any other. “Not enough to convince Olivier Giroud, his teammate at Chelsea, who believes on the contrary that NG (his nickname)” deserves everything that happens to him and praise “, even if he confesses that in France or with the Blues , we like to overplay the caricature. “I think it flatters him even if he doesn’t like compliments too much. He prefers to play low profile but we like to chamber him in relation to that. “
We call it the UFO
The problem, therefore, is that everyone has fallen in the trap, turning Kanté into a mascot. The height of the misfortune, he also has the physique of the job. NG:
“It’s doing too much. It doesn’t have to be. It’s true that I like having good relationships with my teammates, with the people I meet in the street or in football. But we shouldn’t make a big deal out of it. There are other people like that in football as well. “
Manu Imorou, who worked with him closely in Caen, brushes aside this last statement: “guys like Ngolo, that doesn’t exist even outside of football. And precisely, it’s good to have a guy like that, because he brings freshness. It takes us out on the business side. The costume of a model employee can be heavy to wear, especially in a country which requires, we do not know in the name of what, a certain exemplary nature of its footballers. “It can put him at odds with other players whose attitude we are going to criticize by saying ‘look at N’Golo, he is not doing this or that to him”, “continues Imorou.
A “fucking sore loser”
There is still one thing that should not be taken as an example from the Chelsea midfielder. Not the biggest flaw in the world, either, but it seems he cheats at cards. “I’m not the only one to say it”, laughs Giroud. A trait specific to the competitors that Kanté was already dragging to Caen, where it was not about cards but Fifa. Manu Imorou:
“We played Fifa in internship and I can tell you that he’s a fucking sore loser (laughs)! And it’s funny to see him talking to his player while we play, you feel it’s impulsive, spontaneous. In fact, he doesn’t get mad, he groans, and it’s so surprising that it makes it funny. He’s like all of us. We all have our mini-flaws. But as you never see NG in the media, few people really know him and that supports the myth. To counter [l’image du joueur trop sympathique], he would have to put himself forward, but it is not his personality. “
The snake bites its tail but a way out seems possible. The door is only ajar, but Kanté’s name has been circulating more and more for the 2021 Ballon d’Or since Chelsea’s victory in the Champions League. A good opportunity to assert his individualism, even if it is hard to imagine the guy doing the rounds of meals like Cristiano Ronaldo and Jorge Mendes to go scratching vocals in Liechtenstein. In any case, he has all the admiration of the Hungarian coach, Marco Rossi. “If I could, I would vote for him. It’s certain. Kanté is a very complete player, starting almost from zero and reaching the top of world football. It is impossible not to admire him and even to criticize him. “
Of the usefulness of being selfish
For the moment, NG is playing her shy, arguing, and he’s not wrong, that it’s still a little too early to think about it. But he thinks about it. “The Ballon d’Or flatters him,” says Giroud. He doesn’t really like compliments, he prefers to keep a low profile. He starts to get a little stressed and tense when he hears about this. “” I don’t know if you can qualify that as individualism, but he has a strong personality despite what we can see, adds Imorou. He’s a competitor, so I imagine the closer he gets to the Ballon d’Or, the happier he is. Nobody spits on the Golden Ball. “
N’Golo Kanté will remain N’Golo Kanté, we will not change him overnight. Not sure that he even wants to. But if he still does not manage to do it outside, he understands the need to force his nature to progress on the ground: “When I find myself in the zone of the last 30 meters, I sometimes have to be selfish, to take the lead. hit. And why not, let’s be crazy, have a little melon.