Deschamps discusses the mental health of his players and Mbappé, “in a complicated situation”

Guest of “Téléfoot” on Sunday, Didier Deschamps spoke about the difficult question of the mental health of footballers. Castigating the intense pressure put on players by their employers, but also the era of social networks.

Gradually, tongues loosen and the world of football more easily addresses the issue of players’ mental health. Exhausted by crazy schedules, subjected to intense popular and institutional pressure, footballers regularly talk about their periods of “less good”.

Can lead to disappointing sporting performances, phases of doubt or even depression. “A footballer is a human being. The environment is different, because there is an exhibition today,” concedes Didier Deschamps on the subject, Sunday in the “Téléfoot” show on TF1.

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“The smallest word, social networks, and then the sequence… I spoke with some of my players. After a competition like the Euro, to have barely three weeks (of rest), you have struggling to recover. The demands are getting higher and higher.”

“It’s the head that controls the legs”

If physical saturation can be quantified, mental overload is more difficult to detect. And the coach would like his players, like all the others, to be able to slow down a little sometimes.

“Every time you have to, you have to, you have to. And then sometimes, it doesn’t respond or it responds less well. There can be a psychological state… Going as far as depression, I don’t know , but a psychological state which is fragile. It is the head which controls the legs.

Concerning Kylian Mbappé, not called up by his coach for the November international window, Deschamps is willing to admit that his captain “is in a complicated situation”. “But that doesn’t take away what he did and that he is supposed to find everything he was able to do very well. Even if he too, in 2024, was less effective.”