To mark the publication of his autobiography “Hugo Lloris: Earning my Spurs”, the now Los Angeles FC player, who defended Tottenham's goals 447 times, has exclusively published extracts from his book in The Telegraph .
Tottenham played in the first Champions League final in its history in 2019. Mauricio Pochettino miraculously led Spurs there, but the outcome of the match against Liverpool was not the happiest. The Londoners lost 2-0. Years after the event, French goalkeeper Hugo Lloris revealed a memorable anecdote from this final.
Finals with Tottenham: “I played three finals with Tottenham – two League Cups (2015 and 2021) and a Champions League – in which we didn't score a single goal. It's very disappointing to have experienced all these emotions and the adventure ends like that I don't know if everyone at the club and in the team realized how difficult it is to reach a final, and how difficult it is to get there. come back I'm not sure we understood that this was perhaps the only chance of our career to win the Champions League, that the club we were playing for was not made to win it, that we would have. could avoid hearing again the complaint that 'Tottenham never win anything', that our names could have been etched forever in the history of the club. That's what this penalty took away from us.
Getty Images
Daniel Levy and watches: “We all have an engraved memory. Four days before the (Champions League) final, Daniel Levy brought us all together to announce that with the support of a sponsor, we would each receive a luxury aviator watch from the from the club We were first delighted to see the beautiful boxes Then we opened them and discovered that they had engraved the player's name on the back of each watch and: “Champions League 2019, finalist”. . Finalist. Who can do such a thing at a time like this? I still haven't gotten over it, and I'm not the only one. If we had won, he wouldn't have asked that on the back. watches be engraved instead: “Winner”. I have a lot of respect and esteem for him (Daniel Levy) and everything he did for the club as president, but there are things that I don't like. it is not sensitive. Although the watch is magnificent, I have never worn it. I would have preferred not to wear it at all, Levy would not have been surprised if we lost 1-. 0 after a few minutes: it was written. At the post-match reception at the hotel, I had the impression that some of the people at the club and some of the players were not sufficiently depressed by the defeat. I would have liked someone to come to me and say: “Don't worry, Hugo. Never again. We will give you the means to try again.” But when I went back to my room on the night of the final, I think I had the same feeling as Mauricio (Pochettino) and Harry (Kane): “Does the club really want to win? Real Madrid n 'Never would have celebrated a losing final, and we shouldn't have done it either.'
The Amazon documentary: “Everything was difficult after that, for Mauricio Pochettino and for us. The club had finally invested in recruitment, but we had not digested the Champions League final and the squad was not yet sufficiently reactivated, not to mention the tensions which would only grow after a decision by the club which would affect the daily functioning of the team A decision taken without the consent of either the staff or the manager: installing cameras everywhere for the Amazon series on Spurs. Given the above sum – around £10 million – we wondered whether those whose season and activities would be affected, everyone who was asked to wear a microphone every day, would receive a share. The answer was not long in coming: no. When the film crew placed small microphones on certain tables in the canteen, we went to sit at other tables. The only place. where we could speak freely was the training locker room. Otherwise, they had microphones and cameras everywhere, even at certain training sessions, which was no small thing. It was a constraint and it had consequences.”
Images
Time spent with Antonio Conte: “I found Antonio Conte to be a great character, driven by victory, which gave him energy, but he had a lot of difficulty controlling his frustration when we started to draw matches, and even more so when we lost, because his inner torment had to come out If he was tormented, everyone else had to share this torment too, and things could get complicated very quickly. He told me one day that during class. In any given week, his happiness lasted for an hour, right after the victory, and that was it. During matches, Conte was as extreme and explosive as he looked, and he inspired respect and awe. This strong personality pushed the full-backs to prefer to play on the other side of the bench. I never forgot our first defeat under Conte: a 2-1 defeat against NS Mura in Slovenia in the Conference League. not played, I was entitled to his cries and reproaches, like everyone else. In group meetings, we spent at least 30 minutes a day analyzing videos, not forgetting the endless preparation meetings in our training center. training. After the defeat in Maribor, he started shouting: “Mura, Mura, who is Mura? We lost to Mura.” I still hear it. If a player needed a little affection, it was best not to knock on Conte's door. For Conte, confidence is earned in training. He has no filter, he is sincere, honest. He is a coach who lives only for results, whereas from a player's point of view, performance is also important.”
