Stéphane Caristan

🚨 Luka Modric on Zinedine Zidane: “Everybody is sharing that touch from Zizou vs Belgium. I watched it and laughed because people are discovering something Real Madrid players spent years trying to understand. How does this man still have that touch? We had a little game in training. If Zizou was near the pitch and the ball went out, somebody would deliberately hit it towards him harder than necessary. We just wanted to catch him. One day Marcelo absolutely fired one at him. Zizou controlled it like somebody had gently passed him the television remote. Marcelo looked at me. I looked at Toni. Nobody said anything. Zizou passed it back and asked, ‘What?’ Marcelo said, ‘Nothing, Mister.’ Zizou smiled. He knew exactly what we were doing. After that it became worse. Higher ball. He controls it. Awkward bounce. He controls it. One day I told him, ‘Mister, eventually one of us is going to give you a bad enough pass.’ He said, ‘Luka, there are bad passes. There doesn’t have to be a bad first touch.’ Sometimes he would join a rondo and suddenly training became personal. Casemiro once said, ‘Coach, you know you retired, yes?’ Zizou said, ‘Yes.’ Casemiro pointed at the ball. ‘Does the ball know?’ We all laughed. People ask why that Real Madrid dressing room respected him so much. Cristiano. Sergio. Karim. Marcelo. Toni. Casemiro. Gareth. Myself. Big personalities who had already won everything. But occasionally the manager would walk onto the training pitch and remind you that before he became the man explaining football to you, he was Zinedine Zidane. If Zizou stopped training and told me, ‘Luka, your body needs to be positioned differently when this ball arrives,’ what was I supposed to say? ‘Are you sure?’ The man could probably demonstrate it wearing his suit. Apparently tonight he decided to prove that too. But everybody will talk about the touch and miss the better part of his performance. France were losing 1–0. That is where you really saw Zizou. He didn’t panic because the match wasn’t following his plan. He waited. Around the hour he sent Michael Olise and Rayan Cherki on together. I can imagine Michael asking, ‘What do you want me to do?’ And Zizou saying something very complicated: ‘Play football.’ Then Da Cunha comes. Later Doue. Suddenly Belgium have a completely different France in front of them. Doue scores. Olise creates Cherki’s goal. Olise scores. Then Olise scores again. 4–1. That isn’t magic. That is management. I remember after we won one of our Champions Leagues, somebody mentioned how calm Zizou seemed when matches became difficult. I told them, ‘You think he is calm because you are watching him. Try being the player.’ Sometimes we would be struggling and he would walk into the dressing room like we were 3–0 ahead. He’d move one thing. Tell one player, ‘Stay here.’ Tell another, ‘When he receives it, go.’ Then: ‘Okay. Play.’ You’d walk back outside thinking, ‘Surely there should be more?’ Then somehow the game made sense again. That is why I was never surprised by what he achieved at Madrid. People can talk about the squad he had. Of course we had incredible players. But incredible players still need somebody they believe. Imagine receiving instructions from Zinedine Zidane every morning, then watching him join training and remind you that his first touch might still be better than yours. He won three Champions Leagues in a row with us. That doesn’t happen because somebody has aura. Tonight was a small example of why. France gave him a difficult match. He controlled that too. Then, with practically the final touch of the evening, the ball came towards him on the touchline. Perfect control. I laughed again. All these years later, we’re apparently still trying to give Zizou a bad ball. And we’re still waiting.”