It’s been four years since William Vainqueur hung up his crampons. He gave a moving testimony, explaining the role he had unknowingly played in the dark habits of his former recruiter.
At Standard, William Vainqueur had recovered his health. Arriving from Nantes in 2011, he left Sclessin three years later to sign for Dynamo Moscow for six million. The rest of his career includes stints at clubs such as AS Roma, Olympique de Marseille and Monaco.
But let’s go back to its beginnings. In Nantes, Vainqueur was spotted by recruiter Ahmed Gueninèche. The latter was sentenced to 18 years of criminal imprisonment for rape and sexual assault on a minor in 2022. L’Equipe returned to this dark affair in the form of a long investigation.
William Vainqueur thus discovered that his name had been used as bait to attract new young victims, eager to break into the world of professional football. It was a thousand miles from imagining such a thing: at the start of his career, the midfielder had even gone so far as to give Gueninèche power of attorney over his accounts.
A difficult confrontation
The former Standardman agreed to testify during the trial despite the state of shock: “When the commissioner told me everything, I was taken aback, it was a real shock. She was the one who explained to me that he used to use my name to achieve his ends with children I was so far from suspecting all this. My first daughter, when she was born, I put her in Ahmed’s arms. “.
Vainqueur unfortunately discovered that Ahmed Gueninèche’s actions were of great magnitude: “I felt indebted to all the victims. At the trial, it blew up in my face: among them, I recognized a guy that I had I encountered during a tournament a player I remembered very well, who had a strong character. Imagine that even a person like him could have been abused by Ahmed… At the end of the trial, I went to see him. told him: honestly, bro, I’m so sorry.”
