Guy Stephan is miffed with the suggestions that Karim Benzema and the other Muslim Footballers especially those who roots lie in in Africa are not playing the Euros for France only because of their religion and race.
Benzema himself had recently hinted that a particular political group in the country whose ideologies discriminate against certain races might have pressurized the head coach to induce his non-inclusion.
Benzema found voice of support from a few others including a former great who tore into the head coach accusing him to be a hard core French and not open enough to embrace the other races.
While, the head coach has kept silence on the matter and has only expressed his intention of taking the accusers to the court, one of his loyal associates Stephan urges for all the false talks to stop for the benefit of the team which is in serious business at the moment and can ill-afford any distractions with tournament just hours away.
As per Stephan, Benzema’s reaction is shocking because he had the backing of Deschamps through the most horrendous time of his career when he had a goal drought. Yes, he did not directly accuse the coach of having racial reservations, but, for him to even say that the coach’s selections were influenced by the political pressures was highly unfitting.
Stephen acknowledges that the French society has some issues and not only racism, but, issues related to economy and other areas, but, he reckons everything can’t be associated with the national soccer side and not specifically to the head coach.
What makes this whole controversy perplexing is that more than 50% of the players which are to represent Les Blues in Euros do not have their roots belonging to France, but, to other continents. How can it be a case of racial discrimination then?