It was information that had begun to circulate at the beginning of the month in the Italian press, the French international footballer Franck Ribéry announced this Friday the end of his career as a player. At 39, the former star of the France team and Bayern Munich, plagued by injuries, says stop after 18 years of a rich career in a video posted on social networks.
“The pain in my knee has only gotten worse and the doctors are formal: I no longer have a choice, I have to stop playing. So I have to put an end to my career as a professional player”, explains Ribéry, who had been playing since the summer of 2021 at Salernitana, in the Italian 1st division.
Ribéry leaves behind an atypical career
Irresistible dribbler, character sometimes endearing or annoying, Franck Ribéry leaves behind him an atypical career, started late for the turbulent child of Boulogne-sur-Mer: a “Kaiser” adored at Bayern Munich, a more damaged image in France. The former supersonic N.7, betrayed by his knee, decided to put an end to more than two decades of professionalism, terminus of multiple peregrinations in France (Boulogne, Alès, Brest, Metz, Marseille), in Turkey (Galatasaray ), Germany (Bayern Munich) and Italy (Fiorentina, Salernitana).
Excluded from the Lille training center, Ribéry started his career in Boulogne in the third division, wandered from club to club until making a name for himself, first in Metz, Galatasaray then at OM, integrating selection at 23, before the 2006 World Cup where Zinedine Zidane’s Blues failed in the final.
12 years and 23 trophies at Bayern
The big leap to Munich in 2007 marked the beginning of a love affair with Bayern, lasting twelve years and crowned with 23 trophies.
At the Allianz Arena, “Kaiser Franck” (in reference to “Kaiser Franz” Beckenbauer) remains an idol: the ovation he received when he scored his last goal at home, after a slalom of which he has the secret against Frankfurt, was commensurate with his immense career in Bavaria. The French won everything there, whether in the Bundesliga (nine titles), in the Cup (six), SuperCoupe (four). On the European scene, the peak of his career coincided with the treble Cup-Championship-Champions League in 2013, the year of his third place in the Ballon d’Or.
His association with Arjen Robben, another brilliant dribbler, delighted the supporters of the German giant, to the point that their duo merged into the same nickname: “Robbéry”, or “Rib-Rob”. The character of these two very strong personalities has sometimes led them to spectacular clashes, including a fight in the locker room in 2012 on the evening of a Champions League match.
Ribéry, however, did not know the route of a spoiled child
If he succeeded in everything with Munich, Ribéry did not however know the itinerary of a spoiled child. Son of the poor neighborhoods with a scarred face – the aftermath of a car accident when he was two years old – he also made headlines for his extra-sporting escapades.
In 2010, he was accused of being a leader during the strike of the Blues in Knysna, in the middle of the South African World Cup, which earned him three suspension matches. From there dates his disenchantment with the French public, reinforced the same year by the “Zahia” affair, when the justice system reproached him for priced relations with a minor prostitute. He was finally released in 2014.
At the start of 2019, the “golden steak” controversy fueled the bad buzz machine: the attacker appeared in a restaurant in Dubai in front of a piece of meat covered in gold, fueling a recurring criticism of the “bling -bling” prized by footballers. “Let’s start with the envious, the angry, surely born from a holey condom: fuck your mothers, your grandmothers and even your family tree”, insults the player in return on social networks. “I owe you nothing, my success is above all thanks to God, to me, to my loved ones and to those who believed in me. For the others, you were just pebbles in my socks”.
Often mocked for his rough use of Molière’s language
The Frenchman with 81 caps and 16 goals is often mocked for his approximate use of the language of Molière (“the routourne will turn”), until the Guignols de l’Info who inflict on him a puppet with a low forehead. Germany will have better appreciated the talent and endearing personality of Ribéry, married to Wahiba and father of five children.
His admirers prefer to remember his schoolboy jokes, his unscrewed salt shakers, his buckets of water placed on top of the doors, and his collision against a wall when he wanted to get behind the wheel of the team bus during an internship in Dubai. In France, his selection career ended prematurely after his injury package for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. Like a taste of unfinished.