This is a really weird time in football. We’re seeing legendary teams like Manchester United fall apart under former coach Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. We’re also seeing superteams like PSG not live up to what was expected from them, at least for now. All of this has resulted in Manchester United wanting the services of PSG coach Mauricio Pochettino, and the French club wanting to get Real Madrid legend, Zinedine Zidane, into the team in case Pochettino leaves, per source.
I’ll be honest, as you can see from the title, I’m not really a fan of the whole move, and the reasons are plenty. None of them is from the perspective of Zidane’s influence on Kylian Mbappe’s decision. There are a lot of reasons why Zidane just wouldn’t manage PSG. A couple of them are similar to why Manchester United didn’t deserve him.
Why would Real Madrid the legend not go and manage the best French team in the world?
Zidane’s loyalty to his hometown, Marseille
A few years ago – seven, to be precise – Zidane talked about his hometown Marseille, and how he regrets not ever playing for the club from that town. He said, “OM (Olympique de Marseille) is in a good position. I never played here, but it was a desire that was never fulfilled.”
In another interview with La Provence, Zidane mentioned this, “I am from Marseille, I left very young and I don’t live here, but I return from time to time and I just know that I am Marseille. It will be like this for life.”
I think that tells you all you need to know about his love for Marseille. Now, if you know just a little bit about French football, I think you’d also know about “Le Classique”, a name that was given to an age-old rivalry between two clubs, Paris-Saint Germain and Olympique De Marseille. As people like to call it, it’s the French equivalent of El Clasico.
These are the two most successful teams in France, and I don’t see why PSG would be an option for Zidane given that he still has love in his heart for Marseille. Especially after never getting to play for the club, I don’t think Zidane is the kind of man who’d betray the city he loves so dearly. There is absolutely no way. Money doesn’t buy loyalty, and Zidane is known to be a loyal player and coach.
Zidane would not give up on his dream of coaching the France national team
In 2019, France National team manager Didier Deschamps talked about who he thinks could be the next French national team coach. To that, he said, “The next coach could be Zizou. At one point or another, it’ll be him.”
Earlier this year, when Zidane left Real Madrid for the second time, there were reports about him rejecting literally every single club offer so that he’s able to take up the France national team job whenever it becomes available. He thinks it could be either after the 2022 World Cup, or after the 2024 European Championships. Even French FA president Noel Le Graet wants him to take over from Didier Deschamps when it’s time, according to the same source.
Simply put, no other job makes more sense for Zinedine Zidane. We can talk about the PSGs and the Manchester United’s all day long. But, when it comes to a move that makes sense, this one right here takes the cake. Zinedine Zidane loves France, and France loves Zidane back. It’s a match made in heaven: It’s the perfect team for Zidane, and he is the perfect coach for them.
When you look back on his time as Real Madrid head coach, especially in his first tenure, you look at a team of superstars slowly moulded into an almost unbeatable team, led by the person who has won it all himself, and knows how to keep the players calm, in shape and ready for the biggest of games. Zidane knows what it’s like. For a World Cup-winning team that has an amazing crop of players right now, there is simply no better coach to manage all the egos in the dressing room.
Zidane has mentioned it himself, he knows he’d want the job at some point. He has a way of dodging the questions about his future or about transfers, but it just feels right, having him coach France. Nothing can make him give up on his big dream.
Would Zidane like to go to the club that disrespected its biggest asset?
Let’s forget about the other two slides for a second now. Let’s pretend that the Marseille thing wouldn’t have an effect on his decision, even though it will, and that the France job can wait, even though Zidane would not want it to. There are troubles within the whole PSG setup, the whole organization that just doesn’t scream “Zidane as manager”. Let’s talk about the club’s biggest asset, Kylian Mbappe.
Kylian Mbappe, as we all know, is a Real Madrid target. He was poised to join Real Madrid this season. He asked PSG to let him go for the right amount of money to Real Madrid, as he wanted to realise his dream of playing for the royal white shirt of Los Blancos. It never happened. PSG ignored all of Real Madrid’s offers, and Mbappe ended up staying even though he didn’t want to.
It doesn’t quite end there, though. Leonardo told the press that Mbappe talked to him about it very late, while he said in his interview with RMC Sport that it actually was at the start of July, so that PSG had ample amount of time to look for a replacement.
The fact that they’d not only ignore the wishes of the player they are so hell-bent on keeping, but also disrespect him publicly would probably make Zidane think twice, thrice and a lot more times before moving to Paris.
While Zinedine Zidane was the manager of Real Madrid, the signing that he wanted the most was of Kylian Mbappe. He knows what it’s like to have a player like that in the team, because he once was that player. And the disrespect that Mbappe received speaks volumes of the kind of people the club is run by. Would he also be treated like that if he ever wanted to leave PSG for the job of, say, the French national team? Would he also be disrespected publicly? Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?
Working with Leonardo Araujo is not something Zidane would like
When Zinedine Zidane was at Real Madrid – particularly during the first tenure – he never once was disrespected by any of the higher-ups publicly, and I don’t think privately, even. Yes, it helped that he is the prodigal son that returned to Real Madrid as a coach during a period of difficulty, but his own abilities and success as a coach played a part in it.
Florentino Perez, the most vocal of the higher-ups at Real Madrid, never disrespected him in his first tenure (we’ll get to the second term later), and has talked about Zinedine Zidane like a father talks about his own son.
Zidane won’t really get any of that at PSG. But, that’s not the important part. He might even have to face the opposite.
Leonardo, the sporting director of PSG, has had rifts with players and managers in the past before, most notably recently as I mentioned, when he talked ill of Mbappe in front of the press. This certainly wasn’t the first time.
If you look at the image above, it’s of Thomas Tuchel and Leonardo. Thomas Tuchel was sacked in the middle of the season back in 2020, mainly because of disagreements over transfer strategies, and that he didn’t feel appreciated when he guided PSG to their first and only Champions League final. The fuel to the fire was added when Tuchel addressed the transfer issues publicly.
Tuchel, before getting sacked, also talked about how it’s really difficult to manage PSG because of being forced to get involved with politics.
Now, Leonardo didn’t really react properly to Tuchel’s public comments about the transfers, either. He talked ill of Tuchel in front of the press and told everyone that he may be sanctioned. This isn’t the first time. Trust me when I say that Leonardo is very difficult to work with.
Obviously, I don’t speak from experience, but the evidence is there to be seen. Would Zidane really want to work with such a director? I really, really doubt it. It’s the power plays that hold a lot of value at PSG, and whether you are doing well or not, you can be gone in a jiffy if Leonardo doesn’t think well of you.
Zidane won’t join PSG for the same reason he left Real Madrid
Zidane has left Real Madrid twice, both because of different publicly-stated reasons. The first one was because of him feeling like the club needed a new approach to stay at the top level. What I, among many other people think, is that he left because of not being able to have much of a say in what the club should go for in terms of transfers.
There wasn’t a lot of transfer activity during his first tenure, and it was clear that he wanted more responsibility, more authority and more power so that the club, the team and its coach could function in the best possible way. Judging by past managers’ respective tenures at PSG, I just think that if Zidane joins PSG, history will repeat itself.
I am not talking about history in the sense of the different accolades that he picked up while he was at Real Madrid. I am talking about the lack of a say in transfer-related decisions. I’d say that this reason is sort of connected with the previous one. Because I said similar things when I was talking about Tuchel’s tenure.
Now, the second stint had a different reason for his leave. This was much more personal, much more detailed, as Zidane talked about it in an open later via AS. The Frenchman said that he didn’t feel like he had the backing of the club that he needed to function properly as a coach. He didn’t feel he was protected by the club, in fact, things were leaked by the club in order to put pressure on him and on the team to perform well, and he didn’t like that. The club, according to Zidane, didn’t trust him to build a future for this team, which is why he left. I think this is also related to having a say in transfers, but there’s more to it.
Do I honestly think PSG will offer him all that he didn’t get at Real Madrid? Yes. Do I think they’ll actually fulfil their promise? Probably not.
Zidane wouldn’t leave Real Madrid, a club that he so dearly loves, only to join PSG – a club that is disliked by people from Marseille, a club that doesn’t protect its biggest assets publicly, a club that doesn’t back their manager publicly, a club that simply doesn’t support the manager nearly as much as they should.
PSG may have contacted him, but it’s still his decision, and I just don’t see him accepting it under any circumstances whatsoever.