Habib Beye had messages to convey. Questioned by RFI during a long-term interview published this Friday evening, the Stade Rennais coach spoke about the situation of his club and the state of Ligue 1. Above all, the former Senegalese international (45 caps) spoke about the 2025 African Cup of Nations, which begins this Sunday in Morocco.
Finalist in the competition in 2002 with the Lions of Téranga, Beye took the opportunity to make a rant about the date of release of players by the clubs. While the latter were supposed to join their selection to prepare for the continental deadline after the weekend of December 7, they were ultimately released only after December 15, offering only one week of complete preparation to the teams involved.
“The CAN is not a secondary competition”
“This problem is recurring and it is damaging for the image of the CAN and for sporting fairness,” judged the 48-year-old technician. “The CAN often suffers from the vagaries of the international calendar: it was moved to give priority to the Club World Cup, which relegated it to second place,” he recalled, in reference to the dates originally planned for the competition, in the summer of 2024.
“In the eyes of Gianni Infantino (President of Fifa), it was more important to have the Club World Cup than the CAN at that time of the year. Releasing the players six days before kick-off is insufficient to prepare for a major tournament: it complicates the work of the selectors, disrupts the organization and, in fact, devalues the competition. European clubs must understand that the CAN is not a secondary competition,” he said.
According to Habib Beye, combating the “interference” of Fifa – as he denounced on December 4 – and offering real support to football on the continent will automatically involve better representation of African coaches in Europe. “I think I am the only one today in the five major championships, at least in the first division,” noted the former Red Star coach, also citing the example of his compatriot Omar Daf in Ligue 2, in Amiens.
“No one will stop me from going where I want to go”
“It encourages me even more to show the way (…) I want to inspire young people, to tell them that nothing is impossible, that we should not set limits for ourselves and that we should not let others decide for us. I hope that my example will pave the way for other coaches from the African continent or from diversity. »
Asked about the example of Pape Diouf, his president at Olympique de Marseille between 2004 and 2007, who had defined himself as “a sympathetic anomaly” as the only black manager in a major European club, Beye wanted to distance himself. “Today, I do not consider myself to be a sympathetic anomaly, I consider that I am here because I deserve it through my work and through the desire that I have today to train at a very high level and to continue to progress and to confront myself with what is best (…) Nobody will stop me from going where I want to go,” he said.
Under the orders of Habib Beye, strongly threatened at the end of October, Stade Rennais has regained ground and now finds itself in sixth position in the Ligue 1 standings.
