There could be trouble brewing at the Santiago Bernabeu, with Zinedine Zidane’s obsession threatening to undermine his second tenure at Real Madrid.
According to Don Balon, Los Blancos president, Florentino Perez, is unhappy that his coach appears to continuously be on the lookout for French players.
A coach looking to hire his countrymen is nothing new of course.
Louis van Gaal’s time at Barcelona was noticeable for how many Dutchmen followed him to the Camp Nou, whilst Arsene Wenger took the likes of Patrick Vieira, Emmanuel Petit and Nicolas Anelka to Arsenal.
However, Don Balon suggest that Perez had hoped to give the Real Madrid first-team a more Spanish and south American flavour, but this has been cast aside because of Zidane’s continued pursuit of the likes of Paul Pogba.
Even now, Eduardo Camavinga, N’Golo Kante and Rayan Cherki are all being linked to the club per Don Balon. The common denominator? They’re all French.
It can’t be said that those players aren’t the right fit for Los Blancos, because it does seem that they all possess the requisite quality to make them a success.
But Zidane should know more than most that what Florentino wants, Florentino gets.