During an interview given to Marseille Football ClubRod Fanni returned to Marcelo Bielsa's time at OM during the 2014-2015 season. The former player did not adhere to the Argentinian's precepts: “Two seasons with him, you want to stop playing football. And I don't say that laughing, said the former Marseillais. The weekend was a treat. But the training weeks are robotic. We ate three hours of video, you filmed behind a model 15 times, then 15 times behind another and three times there… And go home. There was no match. The rare oppositions that we had were individual marking, it didn't even look like a match. If your player goes to the ends of the earth, you follow him. You find yourself at the corner point as a central defender, you don't know why. And the others are forbidden from recovering the ball”declared the native of Martigues.
“You want to kill yourself”
Rod Fanni doesn't understand the point of the exercises the Argentinian asked him to do: “It was nonsense but it was just to ruin us mentally and physically, to make us angry. Really ? I only saw that. You run behind models, you pass to number 8, which gives to 4, 4 to 7… Afterwards, you look at the computer, new plan: 9 gives to 4, 12 to 13… Two and a half hours , every day, every day, every day… You don't want to play football anymore! You get up in the morning, you don't feel like it. There is zero pleasure. When I tell you zero, hateful. »
Paradoxically, the former player enjoyed himself during the weekend matches: “The match was a blast for us! We all wanted the ball, we all made ourselves available. That's the paradox, you enjoy yourself on the weekend, but during the week, you piss yourself off like never before, you want to kill yourself. Limit if you tell me “divide your salary in half but you train”, I would have said yes. I only had fun on the weekends”he continued.
That season, OM won 21 matches, conceded 6 draws and 14 defeats. Paradoxically, apart from a difficult period in April, the majority of Marseille supporters have kept very good memories of this season. Other players consider that El Loco taught them a lot and allowed them to reach new levels. And a manager like Pep Guardiola is also full of praise for Marcelo Bielsa, who “always makes his players better”. Ten years later, the technician continues to split.
