Fabien Alain Barthez (born
28 June 1971 in Lavelanet
) is a former French football goalkeeper who won honours
with Manchester United and
the French national
team, with whom he won the 1998
FIFA World Cup and Euro 2000 and
reached the final of the 2006 World
Cup. He shares the record for the most
World Cup finals clean
sheets with
Peter Shilton, with
10. Professionally, he has kept goal for his clubs to a
Champions League title and several
Ligue 1 and
Premier League titles.
Club career
Marseille
Born in
Lavelanet, France
, Barthez
made his first division debut for Toulouse on 21 September 1991, against Nancy. He joined
Marseille in 1992, and won both the
French championship and the
Champions League at the end of his
first season in Marseille. His performance in the final against
Milan was one of the best ever seen for a
goalkeeper, and the 1993 victory made him the youngest goalkeeper
to win a Champions League title until
Iker
Casillas did so in 2000.
However, Marseille would be stripped of their domestic title,
though not of the Champions League crown, due to their involvement
in a domestic
match fixing scandal, and
a year later (1994) would suffer a forced relegation to the second
division due to a related financial bankruptcy. Barthez's 1993-94
season is seen by many as his best in
le
Championnat, his many saves and the goalscoring quality of
Sonny Anderson allowed l'OM to finish
second this year. He stayed with the club in Division 2 for the
1994-95 season despite many offers from elite French clubs.
AS Monaco
In 1995, Barthez joined
AS Monaco and
won
Ligue 1 titles in 1997 and 2000.
Manchester United
As a result of Barthez's success in the World Cup and Euro, he
caught the attention of
Manchester United manager
Alex Ferguson, who was searching for a star
goalkeeper to replace the recently-departed
Peter Schmeichel. Barthez joined United for
£7.8 million in 2000. He was later reunited with national
team-mate
Laurent Blanc who joined
Manchester United in 2001. The Barthez-Blanc head-kissing ritual
was performed at the start of Champions League matches.
Well-known for being eccentric, Barthez started out well for
Manchester United. His first season was a triumph as he answered
all the questions about how he would handle rainy Manchester
compared to sunny Monaco. Barthez performed brilliantly throughout
the season and became a crowd favourite. The fans loved his
eccentric behaviour, his taunting dribbles and step-overs past
opposing strikers, and most importantly, his remarkable reaction
saves. Very often it was critical saves that kept United from
defeat or dropping valuable points, helping United to the 2000-01
Premier League title, their third in a row. The only blemish being
his failed attempt at "psyching out" West Ham United's
Paolo Di Canio in the FA Cup 4th Round. Di
Canio beat the offside trap, while Barthez stood still with his
hand up expecting the referee to blow his whistle, or Di Canio to
stop. Di Canio continued and scored the only goal of the
game.
The 2001-02 season was split into two parts for him. The first half
was a nightmare. The Frenchman seemed to be taking some unnecessary
risks outside his penalty area, and his antics began to have
consequences that allowed unneeded goals for opposing teams. He was
at fault for two goals in a home defeat by
Deportivo La Coruña in October
2001, Another couple of errors against Arsenal the following month
put much pressure on Barthez. There was much speculation as to what
was the source of Barthez's decline, and critics urged him to be
dropped. However, Sir Alex Ferguson had faith in his goalkeeper and
stuck by him. Consequently in the second half of the season,
Barthez repaired his reputation with consistent, solid performances
and the spectacular saves that he was famous for.
In 2002-2003 led to another Premier League crown for United. The
season was a mixed bag for Barthez. One highlight was a fabulous
save to deny
Dietmar Hamann's 30 yard
rocket at Anfield as United held on to win 2-1. In other games, he
let goals go past him that shouldn't have done. Barthez was also
widely criticised in United's exit to
Real Madrid in the
Champions League, especially for
Ronaldo's opener which beat him at the near
post. It would prove to be his last ever game with United as Sir
Alex Ferguson's patience had finally run out. Barthez was dropped
for the final 3 games of the season, with
Roy Carroll taking his place.
Return to Marseille
In October
2003, after American
newcomer
Tim Howard won the starting goalkeeper's
job from Barthez, United agreed to release Barthez from his
contract at Old
Trafford
after the
2003-04 season, and also
agreed to loan Barthez out to Marseille for the remainder of that
season. However, FIFA
blocked the
loan deal on the grounds that it was not agreed upon within the
international transfer
window. The two clubs agreed on a loan deal after the
transfer window reopened on 1 January 2004, and Barthez joined
Marseille soon afterwards. On 27 April, Marseille and Barthez
agreed to a two-and-a-half-year contract which would keep him at
the club until spring 2006.
Barthez
was involved in a controversy due to his actions during a friendly
match between OM and Morocco's
Raja Casablanca on
12 February 2005. With 10 minutes left, an OM player was
sent off, and a brawl erupted
between players on the pitch. Barthez was reported for spitting on
the Moroccan
referee. On 21 April, Barthez
was summoned to a hearing before the disciplinary committee of the
French Football
Federation; the following day, he received a six-month
suspension, with the last three months being suspended. In an
unusual move, the federal council of the FFF appealed the
suspension, arguing that the punishment should have been for a
minimum of six full months. Eventually, his suspension was extended
to six full months due to political pressures.
Retirement
On 8 August 2006, Barthez announced he was still hoping to play
professional football for another two years, insisting he was also
looking to continue his career in the French international setup.
His ideal scenario would be a return to first club Toulouse, where
he could be close enough to allow him to take care of his sick
mother. But he said if he did not have a club by 31 August he would
not carry on with football. On 5 October 2006 it was confirmed that
he had retired from football, having failed to agree a return to
Toulouse. Barthez commented:
"The
only club I wanted to go to was not so happy to have me.
It happens and you have to live with it."
Comeback
Barthez during a match against St.
Etienne.
On 17 December 2006, Barthez announced his return to football by
signing a contract with French
Ligue 1 side
FC Nantes Atlantique, who were
lacking an experienced goalkeeper following
Mickaël Landreau's move to
Paris Saint-Germain the previous
summer. Serb goalkeeper
Vladimir
Stojković, originally recruited to replace Landreau, failed to
impress and left Nantes at the winter break following a rift within
the squad.
On 29 April, Nantes chairman
Rudi
Roussillon announced that following an altercation with a
Nantes fan, Barthez had left the city with his family. The next
day, Barthez confirmed that he had quit the team, and the club
terminated his contract. Barthez denied that he was planning to
retire, and in an article for French daily
L'Équipe, he
said that he was looking for another contract for at least 2 years.
Since then Barthez has been linked with numerous clubs but nothing
has ever materialised and he has had to face never playing
professional football again.
On 25 January 2008, after an interview with
Setanta Sports, Barthez says he plans to race
Porsche GT 3s and to play beach football in the future.
International career
1998 World Cup
On 26 May 1994, he won his first
cap
for
France against
Australia. Though
Barthez missed
Euro
1996 where his country went all the way to the semi-finals, he
gained the number one goalkeeping position shortly afterwards and
would not relinquish it for a decade.
In the
1998 World Cup which was
hosted by his home country, Barthez conceded only two goals in
seven games and bagged the
Yashin Award
as the best goalkeeper of the tournament. Barthez was also
well-known during the tournament for letting teammate and good
friend
Laurent Blanc kiss his shaved
head before the start of every match, supposedly for good luck.
Barthez was an integral part of his national team's inaugural
triumph which also made it the first time in 20 years that a host
had won the World Cup; the highlight being a 3-0 shutout of
defending champion
Brazil in the finals. During
the game, Barthez made a spectacular save on Brazilian superstar
Ronaldo, doing his trademark leap/step-over
the attacking striker to grab the ball, which injured Ronaldo in
the process. Barthez was afterwards one of the most popular
national players in France, second to
Zinedine Zidane.
2000 European Championship
Two years later, Barthez was again the starter as his country won
Euro 2000. It
was the first time in over twenty years that a national team held
both the World Cup and Euro titles, a feat last accomplished by
West Germany in 1974.
After that triumph, France held the top position in the
FIFA World Rankings system from
2001-2002.
2002 and 2004 World Cup and Euro
He played on France's World Cup team again in
2002 in which they exited in the first
round without winning a game or scoring a goal. He was also the
starter in
Euro
2004, saving
David Beckham's
penalty shot in the round robin, but France went out in the
quarterfinals to eventual winners
Greece.
2006 World Cup
His placement as starting goalkeeper on France's
2006 World Cup Squad, despite a
substantial public campaign in support of
Grégory Coupet, was surprising to
many—even more so given Coupet's flawless performance in the
remainder of the World Cup qualifying campaign after Barthez's
suspension. This decision was met with derision in the French press
and also led to Coupet's walking out of the national squad before
the tournament, though he was to return one day later. The move was
viewed by some as a desire to keep the veterans of France's 1998
World Cup victory on the team.
L'Equipe reported after the
World Cup that Barthez would have walked out of the squad had he
not been named the starter.
France had a slow start in the group stage, drawing their first two
games and putting their playoff chances at risk. Fortunately,
Barthez's team found their form and won their final round robin
match 2-0 to advance to the next stage, where they upset heavily
favoured
Spain 3-1 in
the
round of 16.
In defeating Brazil, 1-0 on 1 July 2006, Barthez, having made only
one save in the game, became the first keeper to blank the
Brazilian team in consecutive
World Cup finals matches, the first being the 1998 final (3-0).
France is now one of only two nations (along with Argentina) to
have shut Brazil out twice in the World Cup finals, and the first
to have done it in consecutive matches, both times with Barthez in
goal.
Barthez again kept a clean sheet in the semi-final against
Portugal (with
Zinédine Zidane's penalty shot the
winning goal), though he appeared in questionable form. A few
minutes from time, he spectacularly spilled a free-kick which
LuÃs Figo recovered, heading over the
bar although unchallenged.
He did, however, redeem himself in injury
time when a French defender fumbled the ball, enabling a Portuguese
player to mount a last-moment attack.
Barthez scrambled out of the net and blocked the first shot.
During the final against Italy he briefly captained his team for
the remainder of the second period of extra time after Zidane was
sent off. During the penalty shootout, neither he nor his Italian
counterpart
Gianluigi Buffon made a
save, and France striker
David
Trezeguet's missed shot ultimately proved decisive.
Honours
Toulouse
- French Cadet Championship: 1987
Marseille
Monaco
Manchester United
International
Individual
Orders
Statistics
Notes
- http://www.eurosport.fr/football/story_sto979355.shtml
-
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/fabien-barthez-the-goalkeepers-fear-of-losing-it-618203.html
- Anderson, D. (2001). Manchester United 2:3 Deportivo La Coruna. RedCafe.net
- Unofficial Manchester United Website. Retrieved on July 6
2006.
- [1]
- http://www.eurosport.fr/football/story_sto979136.shtml
- BBC SPORT | Football | Europe | Barthez announces
his retirement
- Barthez To Join Nantes - Yahoo! Sport UK
- Barthez quits Nantes after attack - BBC
Sport
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http://www.fifa.com/worldcup/archive/edition=1013/awards/index.html
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