Patrice Evra saw fit to give explanations three years after his conviction for homophobic remarks by the Paris court. To do this, the former captain of the Blues and former Manchester United player in particular chose the columns of the British daily The Times, in an interview on Monday.
Sentenced Thursday to a fine of €1,000 and €1,500 in damages, Evra said in substance that he accepted the conviction but refused the label of homophobe. “I’m hurt because it doesn’t represent me,” Evra said. Yes, I used vulgar language because when I was young it was normal. It makes me think I have so much to learn, but I will keep learning. »
The former defender of the Blues was prosecuted on the initiative of the associations Mousse and Stop Homophobia, supported by the collective anti-homophobia Rouge Direct, for the remarks made on the sidelines of the elimination in the Champions League of PSG on his ground in front of his former Mancunian club of 2019 – “Paris, you are queers, you are queers… Here, it’s the men who talk”.
“I apologized several times”
“I recognized the problem of homophobia in the world of football, so it’s really crazy for me to have this bad press for something I did four years ago,” said Evra. It wasn’t because I meant it, I just used those words. I offended people, I apologized many times. I lost the lawsuit, I paid them and I’m fine. But I don’t agree with people who try to portray an image of me that I’m not. »
Evra pleads broad mitigating circumstances. “It was a private message,” he said. That’s how I grew up. The problem is that you have to adapt. It’s a new world. I immediately apologized because I saw that I was offending people. »
The player trained in Ulis, passed among others by Nice, Monaco, MU, Juventus and OM, refuses to be ranked among the openly homophobic personalities.
“All my life I’ve accepted everyone as they are,” he says. I have to pay these two associations and I hope they will use the money for good things but it’s not just a question of money, it’s that I’m in this situation when I’m not not that person. I made a mistake. In my youth it was not a mistake and now it is. Since that incident, I have never used those words. »
