United stars didn’t want ‘French Day’

NEWCASTLE United’s Gallic recruits were not ‘keen’ on the club’s decision to celebrate their arrivals with French Day in 2013.

That’s the view of former Magpies translator Andrew Simpson, who believes stars such as Yohan Cabaye simply wanted to be accepted as Geordies by the Toon Army.

The sale of Demba Ba in January combined with the club’s unexpected Europa League campaign led to an influx of signings from Ligue 1 in the mid-season window.

Chief scout Graham Carr’s recommendations led to Mathieu Debuchy, Yoan Gouffran, Massadio Haidara, Moussa Sissoko and Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa arriving on Tyneside. Simpson himself joined the same month, and was tasked with translating instructions from manager Alan Pardew and his assistant John Carver.

The January signings added to a strong French contingent boasting the likes of Cabaye and Hatem Ben Arfa as what was known as the French Revolution came to be.

In a bid to welcome the influx of talent from across the Channel, United decided to designate the visit of Southampton on February 24 as ‘French Day’.

La Marseillaise blared out of St James’ Park’s speakers, and the tricolour was replicated across the Gallowgate. Supporters embraced the occasion with facepaint, flags and onion necklaces.

However, despite the good intentions of the gesture from the club and fans alike, Simpson has revealed it was a PR exercise the players would rather have avoided.

He said: “They didn’t like it, funnily enough. The players didn’t really want it to happen.

“That was purely a press thing. People like Cabaye and even the new lads weren’t that keen on it.

“They thought we’ve come to Newcastle, we’re playing for Newcastle, we just want to be Geordies. They didn’t want to be seen as the French guys.

“They didn’t obviously detest it and weren’t going to speak out against it, but they weren’t that warm to it. Their thinking was we’re here to be part of the Newcastle group, we don’t want to be the French guys.

“Fortunately they didn’t really care at the end.”

Ironically it was a Frenchman who opened the scoring for Southampton, with Morgan Schneiderlin’s strike quickly cancelled out by Moussa Sissoko.

A spectacular effort from Papiss Cisse, a Cabaye penalty and an own goal from Jos Hooiveld sealed a thrilling 4-2 victory for the hosts.