Stephane Mazzolini. The two started chasing
each other and they ended up in the dining
hall, with Cantona trying to catch him. They
jumped from table to table, overturning all
the plates, cutlery and glasses. A massacre!
“Eric was the band leader – not of a mafia
gang but of a cheerful little group who were
mostly successful on the field. Later on, one
match in Lens was postponed because of fog,
so we travelled directly to Saint-Brieuc to
prepare for a game at Brest. In the evening,
we went to the town hall at Roscoff, a small
town in Brittany twinned with Auxerre. At
the end of a small ceremony with the mayor,
I realised that seven players had disappeared.
We sat down to dinner and I was facing
a window, through which I saw them coming
back. They were all around Cantona, who’d
shaved his head – he had no more hair.
“Cantona was staying in a room opposite
mine, and that night I heard him talking to
his girlfriend, complaining that his head was
cold. For their little night out, I sanctionedthem two weeks without going out. But the
next day, we played Brest and won.”
Cantona’s first-team debut came at 17,
in 1983. He’d already appeared for France’s
under-17s, although the Foreign Office had
to step in to defuse a diplomatic incident
after he’d travelled to Leningrad for a youth
tournament and spat at the referee – an
officer in the Soviet army. As was mandatory
for French teenagers back then, he also had
to carry out national service, delaying his
progress with Auxerre.
“He was in the Joinville battalion,” Roux
explains, referring to a special military unit
for sportsmen. “One day, the colonel of the
battalion called and told me that a general
was coming for an inspection. He said that
Cantona didn’t shave well, and asked me
what to do. The only solution we found was
to send Eric to get potatoes and get him
home late, so he didn’t run into the general!”
Cantona returned for more brief first-team
appearances in 1985, scoring his first seniora dressing room. The last thing that I need is
another controversial figure in there.”
Liverpool had just turned down the chance
to sign Eric Cantona. A few weeks later, in
December 1991, the France international
announced his retirement at the age of 25.
Banned for a month for throwing the ball at
a referee, the Nimes forward responded to
the disciplinary panel by approaching each
member and uttering the word ‘idiot’ in their
direction, one by one. When the suspension
was then doubled, Cantona called it quits.
Thankfully, his retirement didn’t last long.
On 8 February 1992, a day after the expiry of
his two-month ban, he was making his debut
for Leeds United at Boundary Park against
Oldham Athletic. Nine months later, he joined
Manchester United... and the rest is history.
While Liverpool would go three decades
without a league title, Cantona helped their
biggest rivals end their own 26-year top-flight
drought in 1993 and begin a glittering era of
incredible dominance. Thirty years after his
arrival on these shores, this is the inside story
of the man who changed English football.
1966 WAS A GREAT YEAR...
Born in May 1966, he was raised in Marseille
by father Albert – a painter of Italian heritage
- and mother Eleonore, whose parents had
left Spain during the Civil War. Cantona was
a 14 year old turning out for his junior side
Caillolais when he met his footballing mentor.
“Eric already had that way of standing very
straight, that haughty stance,” long-serving
former Auxerre boss Guy Roux remembers
as he talks to FourFourTwo. “He looked like
a prince at a ceremony alongside the Queen
of England.
“He came to my attention via someone
I’d sent to a trials event in Aix-en-Provence.
They told me about a phenomenon, tall and
physically strong, who already had all the
qualities needed. We immediately tried to
get him to Auxerre. He’d already had a lot of
trials, particularly at Nice, but agreed to come
to our club with a dozen other kids.
“At the end of the ten-day training camp,
we put him into a short eight-vs-eight match
with our first-team professionals and he was
excellent – even if some of them criticised
him for dribbling too much. We could already
tell that there was a fire inside him.
“I met him face to face and asked him if
we could get him something he’d like. He told
me about a jersey, so I sent him to the club
shop where he was given a jersey, some
shorts and socks. I later learned that he’d
made the same request at Nice, and they’d
charged him for it.”
Cantona signed for Auxerre, initially
staying in a lodge that once housed local
monks near the city’s cathedral. He didn’t
exactly live like a monk, though, even then.
“He was the most difficult [to manage],”
Roux admits. “He had a late childhood and
a turbulent adolescence. His training was
under the guidance of Daniel Rolland, and
we managed Eric between us.
“I remember an argument he had one
afternoon with one of his best friends,
THE
STORY OF
MAn UTD62 The Story of Man Utd FourFourTwo.com