“Zidane can't stand disaffection”

“Zidane cannot bear disaffection, he needs to feel loved to fill the lack of parental recognition”, says the French psychoanalyst Sabine callegari, who publishes a book in which he analyzes the current Real Madrid coach.

Over three years, Callegari has studied documentaries, interviews, books, press conferences and articles on Zinedine Zidane to complete his work, which concludes that “the star is, above all, a human being who suffers like everyone else” .

In particular, the author of “In Zidane's head” In an interview with EFE he highlights the lack of affection that was, in his opinion, the reason that led him to leave Real Madrid in 2018 after having won his third Champions League.

“From his statements it is clear that he did not feel the same love for the club and the dressing room and that led him to leave,” explains Callegari, who claims to recognize some similar elements in the current situation of the club and the coach.

But the psychoanalyst emphasizes that, as he himself says, Zizou always gives “300%” to your projects, so he does not consider abandoning the ship.

“He doesn't usually do those things, he always finishes what he begins, he imposes it on himself as a chivalric task. The other time, when he left, he left the club in full party (…) But if he feels betrayed then he will never forgive“, he says.

In his work, Callegari has focused on looking for the unconscious part of the athlete, both in his time as a player and now as a coach, for which he considers to have discovered “things that are not known about Zidane, that perhaps not even he knows same”.

The father figure

At the bottom, the psychoanalyst places the relationship with her father, who Zizou places at the top of his pyramid, but from whom “it has never received the recognition of its exceptionality”.

“Zidane demands absolute love, because it is the way in which he gives himself to others”, says the author. Faced with the image of an unshakable character, the protective mask that has been created, Callegari has found escape points through which, on rare occasions, his true personality emerges.

“Zidane is more than his myth, more than the perfect character who appears in public. If it was perfect, it would not have had those knockouts, like the header to Materazzi or his departure from Madrid in 2018“, he assures.

On those rare occasions, when the legend gives way to the human being, his personality emerges “as a 'geyser' that comes from within himself and that originates in the relationship with his father, which explains his entire life, from his partner to his internal conflicts, the game of masks that shapes his life, its limits, its cracks “.

“Zidane has become what he is without aspiring to celebrity, without wanting to stop being ordinary. But his strength had to come out. Despite everything he has done, despite having achieved unconditional love from the public, he continues to maintain the drama of not having received it from his father, “he says.

Head butt to Materazzi

That internal conflict, the psychoanalyst defends, emerged in a spectacular way on that July 9, 2006, in the World Cup final against Italy, which was his last game and which was marked by his expulsion after leading Marco Materazzi to head butt. “That day many of the elements that make up his hidden self came together, which he tries to combat daily,” Callegari explains.

Specifically, his book cites two, the presence of Filippo Inzaghi on the Italian bench and the singer Nâdiya in the stands.

The book collects the rumor that Inzaghi, with whom he coincided at Juventus in Turin, claimed that he could have a relationship with Zidane's wife, whom, in turn, they related to Nâdiya.

Without entering into the veracity of those rumors, Callegari maintains that the transalpine attacker represents in Zizou's head “his rejected part”, that of a “bad boy” who has always wanted to fight to earn his father's respect.

As for the singer, she supposes the stardom that she never sought, from which she always wanted to protect herself but never stopped admiring. “All the ingredients were at that stage and it ended up exploding,” says the specialist.

From that gesture, he adds, the myth was not weakened. “On the contrary, that personal drama made him more human and that makes him a person capable of overcoming himself.”