A report that left its mark. Didier Roustan, who died this Wednesday, had produced an unpublished report at the beginning of the 1990s. Immersed in the locker room of Olympique de Marseille, he had brought in a… wolf.
“He had brought a wolf into the locker room, more or less tame because it is still a wild animal. I remember this filming which took place in the evening, for part of the report, with all the recommendations not to make any sudden movements, not to look it in the eyes too much”, recounted Eric Di Meco for RMC this Wednesday, inviting listeners, “especially the youngest”, to watch this report “because we see all the poetry, all the touch of Didier Roustan”.
More than thirty years later, Rolland Courbis also remembers it. And one sequence in particular has remained particularly etched in his mind. “There is a passage where (Carlos) Mozer keeps his cool and the wolf passes by him a few centimeters away. If Mozer had made a face, maybe things would have gone badly with the wolf. The report went well but that moment left its mark on me.”
Football lover and pioneer
Considered a “journalism revolutionary”, according to Michel Platini, Didier Roustan was unanimously recognized for his natural kindness and his boundless passion for football. A legendary figure in the sports audiovisual landscape for over 40 years, the native of Brazzaville (Congo) passed away on the night of Tuesday to Wednesday after “several weeks of fighting illness”.
Having worked for TF1, Antenne 2, Canal + and L’Équipe, he also commentated on OM matches on OMtv a dozen years ago. The Marseille club paid tribute to him, also recalling the famous report with the wolf.
“Didier Roustan had a tone. A style. He had ventured into unknown lands of audiovisual, like this avant-garde report for Téléfoot, broadcast in 1991: “Roustan, the wolf and OM” (…) We see a wolf (a real one) walking the streets of Marseille, before entering the Olympian locker room, facing JPP (Jean-Pierre Papin), Bernard Casoni, Pascal Olmeta or Carlos Mozer.
- RMC Sport
