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PSG coach Christophe Galtier, who proposed that his team make their next trips by “sand yacht” rather than by plane, made his mea culpa on Tuesday. He said his irony was in “bad taste”.
The controversial remarks of the Paris-Saint-Germain coach went wrong. The day before, at a press conference, he had proposed that his team make their next trips by “sand yacht”, rather than by plane as they did last weekend to get to Nantes.
Christophe Galtier made his mea culpa on Tuesday, September 6. “Believe me that I am concerned about the problems of climate, of our planet, I know the responsibility that we have (…) We are not above ground, we are very lucid, simply, it is a joke that comes at the wrong time, which is in bad taste, and I regret it”, pleaded the technician at the microphone of Canal +.
>> To read also on France 24: The Champions League, the real test of Christophe Galtier
However, he defended the practices of his club. “I have players who are very careful about the climate, I have serious players, we have a club that is careful. is aware of the climate issues,” he said. The club plans to do it again “when possible”, for Troyes, Reims, Auxerre and Lens.
Aware of having committed his first communication blunder since his appointment this summer, Christophe Galtier nevertheless said to draw lessons from it: “I believe that in France, it is no longer possible to make humor … Even if my joke was not great and I knew it quickly when I got home.”
>> To read also: can professional football be ecological?
A “climate red card”
The remarks provoked outraged reactions from many political leaders, including Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne. They castigated the casualness of the coach on a subject, climate change, which had become ultra-sensitive after a summer of 2022 marked by three heat waves and repeated fires.
NGOs were also appalled. In the evening, just before the Champions League match, won 2-1 against Juventus with a double from Mbappé, Greenpeace deployed a sand yacht and banners very close to the Parc des Princes to award a “climate red card ” at the club.
Frequent use of the train for English clubs
According to a study by the Professional Football League (LFP), of all Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 matches in the 2019-2020 season, 65% of team journeys were made by plane, 31% by bus and 4 % by train.
In the main foreign championships, in Italy, Spain and Germany, the use of the train is not uncommon.
In England, with seven clubs in London – more than a third of the championship – trips are shorter and even the clubs of Manchester or Liverpool do not hesitate to charter trains to go to the capital. In October 2021, however, Manchester United were frazzled for flying to Leicester, 160km by road, a ten-minute flight.
With AFP
