A great servant of sport in general and football in particular, Jean-Pierre Zapata, who was a player and manager in several clubs in the department as well as in Lunel, died at the age of 69.
It is with infinite sadness that we learned of the death, at the age of 69, of Jean-Pierre Zapata. He fought in recent years with immense courage against the disease which finally won the match, this Wednesday, October 9.
In Gard, the name of Jean-Pierre Zapata is closely linked to football. If he did not have the professional career of his father Pierrot, he wore the colors of Nîmes Olympique, Vergèze, La Grand Combe before having a brilliant career as a manager putting his skills at the service of clubs.
His name is also closely linked to sport. At Perrier, he has long been responsible for the sports partnership with the sole aim of helping everyone, from the biggest to the smallest.
In Nîmes, André Sembélie, who was the general director of Perrier, has fond memories of his friend. “We were both born in 1955. And we had known each other since we were 20 years old. In 1976, I was his teammate at Vergèze. And it was thanks to my arrival at the club that I then joined Perrier. Together, we won the honorary promotion championship the first year then the Gard-Lozère cup the next, the first in the club’s history. Our paths then separated as I went to Uzès and he to La Grand Combe, but we never cut ties. »
When André Sembélie rose to prominence at Perrier by becoming general manager, he made Jean-Pierre Zapata head of the sports partnership: “He always had an argument convincing enough for us to help the clubs whose cause he came to plead,” says André Sembélie who delivers this more intimate anecdote: “In 2004, we launched the same sports partnership concept as Perrier in the Vosges with Vittel. On April 20, in the middle of a press conference in Vittel, I suffered a heart attack. Jean-Pierre stayed by my side. We were teammates, I was his superior but we never stopped being friends”
In recent years, he was sports director of the Gallia club in Lunel which, in a few weeks, has just lost its president, Richard Nacarlo and Jean-Pierre Zapata.
To Jean-Pierre’s parents, to whom he paid tribute last July for their 70th wedding anniversary; to his wife, Martine; his daughters, Caroline and Stéphanie; to his grandchildren, Le Réveil du Midi presents its sincere condolences.
Frédéric Prades
