The testimony was expected on Tuesday December 3 at the Paris criminal court. “I was thrown into the jungle and told to get lost! So that was my only way out”declares Mathias Pogba. For the first time since the start of his hearing, at the trial of the Paul Pogba affair, Mathias raises his voice. His voice accelerates, as if he is reliving the panic, the nervousness of these last days of August 2022, the moment when he decides to publish the famous compromising videos. “I am his big brother, but he refused to answer me”he explains.
It has indeed been several weeks since Mathias “tent”according to him, to get in touch with Paul Pogba. In mid-July, when he learned of the kidnapping that had occurred a few months earlier, he immediately went to Turin with his brother’s friends, to the Juventus training center. “I wanted to hear them all at once, a kind of confrontation”explains Mathias Pogba. But that day, none of them managed to cross the center barrier.
A few days later, Mathias claims to have been threatened by strangers in a car in their childhood town of Roissy-en-Brie: “Tell Paul to pay! Otherwise, the next stop is Santeny [où réside leur mère].” “I was terrifiedhe explains on the stand. I was with my hands in the air.” Feeling reinforced when another defendant tells him about having been attacked in turn and having been shot in the hand. “I panicked”says Mathias, still moved. I told myself that the next one on the list was us.”
A reason why, explains Mathias Pogba, he took the other defendants to his mother “so that everyone could tell what they had experienced”. The president seems skeptical in the face of what looks like an attempt at intimidation: “Didn’t you rather want to push her to make Paul react? Why go there in such large numbers?”she asks. “No, I just wanted to inform him, that’s all”replies Paul’s brother.
The days go by. Matthias says he is getting more and more nervous. “I couldn’t think straight anymore.”he remembers. He then publishes the videos. “It became personal between me and Paul”blurted Mathias. The prosecutor insists: “When you recount in these videos his immense level of ingratitude, his stingy side, there was clearly a desire to cause harm.” “Yes, clearly. Today, I regret it”explained Mathias.
Mathias Pogba assures him until then, he had no resentment against his brother. “We called each other once a week. We were on good terms. I had his new phone number”he explains. The president questions him about financial links: “You were at the end of your contract with Belfort. Did you need money, his money?”she asks. “Nonreplies the brother. I had just signed in Australia. I was just waiting for my visa. No, I didn’t need Paul.”
Except that Paul Pogba, during interrogation, gave another version. He assures that he sometimes gave up to 10,000 euros to Mathias. “He asked me again and again. I wanted to return to healthier brother relationships”assured the 2018 world champion. “It’s false”Mathias simply answers today. “People know me, I’m a soldier”he adds. He barely admits to having asked for a little money in 2020, after Covid, when he was without a club for a year. “I asked Paul, but he refused“, says Mathias.
In the room, as since the start of the trial, the absence of Paul Pogba is heavy.
