Real shock as Zidane steps down
Coach quits five days after historic treble
MADRID: Real Madrid coach Zinedine Zidane dropped a bombshell yesterday, quitting the Spanish giants just days after winning the Champions League for a record third year in a row.
The 45-year-old former international decided to quit at the top saying that it was time for a change for himself and the club and admitting he was unsure of his ability to maintain his winning record at Real.
But he said that no other club was involved in his decision to part ways with Real and although experts have linked him to the French national team coaching job, Zidane insisted he is eyeing no other position at this time.
“I have taken the decision to not continue next year as Real Madrid coach,” the Frenchman told a hastily convened press conference.
“This club deserves to continue to win and needs a change” he said, adding that he believed the “moment has come.”
“After three years the club needs another discourse, another method of working,” he added.
Zidane said he was unsure of his ability to inspire the team to more victories.
“I don’t see myself continuing to win this year and I am a winner, I don’t like to lose,” added Zidane, who was under contract with Real until 2020.
“I have thought a lot about this decision and I can’t go back on it.”
Zidane mentioned the struggles the team faced this season, including in the Spanish league and the Copa del Rey.
Madrid finished third in the league — 17 points behind champions Barcelona — and were eliminated at home by Leganes in the quarter-finals of the Copa del Rey, a moment which Zidane said was the worst of his coaching career with the club.
“We went through good moments but also complicated ones, and I don’t forget them,” Zidane said. “I want to leave when everything is going well. This is a good moment to end it well.”
Real beat Liverpool 3-1 in the final in Kiev on Saturday, making Zidane the first coach in history to win three successive Champions League titles.
Zidane has now won nine trophies since replacing Rafael Benitez in the Santiago Bernabeu dugout in January 2016.
He was flanked at the press conference by Real Madrid president Florentino Perez who said Zidane’s announcement was “totally unexpected”.
“It was a completely unexpected decision,” Perez said.
“Today is a sad day for me, for the fans and for all the people who work at the club. I wish we could always have Zidane by our side, but we know that when Zizou makes a decision, the only thing we can do is to accept it and respect it.”
When Benitez was sacked in January 2016, Barcelona daily Mundo Deportivo dismissed Zidane as merely a “sticking plaster”, who would be replaced quickly by a permanent coach.
But Zidane won the confidence of players and the rest is history.
“This is a sad day,” Perez added. “This house will be his family forever, he triumphed and won everything, as you know. I thank him for his commitment, his passion. I have no doubt that he will return.”
Zidane said his decision had nothing to do with Cristiano Ronaldo hinting that he will also leave the club following the Champions League triumph on Saturday.
The bombshell decision came 12 years after another stunning blow from Zidane brought a controversial close to the midfielder’s international career.
He earned a red card in the 2006 World Cup final, probably costing France the title, for his full-blooded headbutt against Italian Marco Materazzi.
As a player, Zidane was in two consecutive Champions League finals with Juventus, losing both times, including one to Madrid in 1998. He finally won the European title as a Madrid player in 2002, scoring an amazing volley in the final against Bayer Leverkusen.
The next step for the former Real Madrid star player is unclear but he has time on his side.
Guy Lacombe, Zidane’s first coach when he joined AS Cannes, his first professional club, in 1988, said that there was little left to challenge the coach who had already won virtually everything.
“But there is one thing...,” Lacombe told AFP. “He would like one day to coach the French national team. He has made no secret of that ambition.
“It will happen at the right time. In the right conditions. There is no rush.”