Now on bbc news, its hardtalk. Welcome to hardtalk from manchester. Im stephen sackur. Of all the football mad cities in the world, few can compete with this one, home to two of the worlds biggest clubs, united and city. For all of footballs global appeal its wrestling with big problems, from financial greed to residual racism. My guest today is former Manchester United and france star patrice evra. Now hes done something most footballers never do. Hes opened up about the emotional scars hes carried through his career. So why has he done it . Patrice evra, welcome to hardtalk. Thank you. What has happened to you . Because as a professional footballer, when you saw journalists you tended to turn the other way, you didnt really want to talk to journalist. But now here you are, youre a massive star on social media, youve just written a searingly honest memoir. What has changed for you . Maybe im more open, more ready, i think emotionally, more open, getting rid of that toxic mass community. I met the woman of my life to help me to open myself to the world. Because i think before that i think i was like a robot, like a machine, just a winning mentality, a survivor. Being abused in my childhood, living in the streetjust like, surviving, i hate people from the street when they call themselves a gangster. Im not a gangster, im just a survivor. You know, born in this world with my colour is already a disadvantage. So all of that make me who i am. Know resilience and you will never give up. And under a minute youve just given me a little bit of a brief insight into your whole life. Lets take it step by step. Right now you are a guy who seemed very much at peace with yourself. But you were not, you very clearly were not. Even on the Football Pitch, you looked like a young man who was angry, who was frustrated. Now you look back, is that true, was there a lot of anger fuelling you . Yes, anger, fire, the dark side. Everything was about fighting, thats the way i grew up. I hate using that word but when i was going in the pitch it was i going to the war for me. I was ready to bleed for the team, for my team mate, for the fan, for the manager. So i had that passion and that adrenaline and the Football Pitch was my way to get out all that fire inside my body. Lets go back even before you were known as a professional footballer on the field of play, lets go back to your childhood. You were born in senegal but you were raised outside of paris. It was tough, your dad left home when you were ten, one of your brothers ended up a drug addict and dead very young. You got involved in petty crime. In some ways its a miracle that you didnt fall out of the system. When i look at it, when i talk about my life in my biography, im lucky. I think without the football i would probably be dead or injail right now. Im ashamed to say it because thats a fact, thats the truth. Like i say, i had to survive. Im not proud about things ive done in the past. When my brother died because he was a drug addict, thats when i knew unfortunately, well, fortunately and unfortunately for my brother, i knew i would never touch any drug. But you did deal drugs for a while . I did some marijuana because when my dad left there wasnt any authority. And for my mum to feed because it one point we were 13 kids at home. 13 . Yeah. Ive got 2a brothers and sisters. My dad never watch tv or use the remote, he was a busy man. And 89 nephews and they all call me santa. So i need to fight for them. I needed to play and do something, a job at having money so everything was possible then. Using any opportunity to get money. There was something that happened in your childhood that i know it has taken you many years to talk about. Something that wasnt about you being defiant, being strong, running on the street, but actually about you as a very vulnerable boy. It happened when you were 13 years old. Why have you decided to tell the world about it now . I decided because i had an extra push with a woman of my life and i was talking about toxic masculinity and to open myself and ifeel safe. She is such a good person and funny, positive but she said i can feel something wrong with you. And i didnt want to know the reason but we watch a documentary about the paedophile and she looked at me and she said, whats wrong . And i said, mothing, nothing. And i burst into tears. And after that i tell her everything. She was the first person, i didnt say it to my mum, to my dad, to any of my brothers and sisters. So when i talk to her i said finally, i think its time to tell it to my mum. And when i read the book, it was finished a year ago, just three months ago called the writer i said we need to change something important. To answer to your question why did it, its not for patrice, ill survive. Im 0k. We dont want to go into too much detail, its not fair, its not right, butjust to give our viewers and listeners just a sense of what happened to you. You were temporarily staying with the head teacher of a school, you been put in School Farfrom your own home, partly because they had a great sports programme. And the teacher promised to offer you accommodation to look after you and in fact groomed you. Exactly. Everything seemed like, perfect. I dont have to travel, took the train, so every time they will cook a nice dinnerfor me, i could play nintendo, some video game and every time i was coming and going to sleep, he was coming, dark, it was really dark and i was in bed and he was trying to touch me. So we fight for ten, 15 minutes, i dont know the time it was for me like an hour or an eternity. And was touching himself next to the bed. One day, he succeeds, when i say succeed, he pulled my pants down. It is hard to talk about. We now know that other talented, young footballers, boys at professional clubs, some in the United Kingdom have been abused. Who knows . It may still be continuing in some places for some young people. It will. And it is and i received many messages already of people saying something similar happened to me and i encourage them to go out and speak. But its not easy. I feel shame myself, i feel guilty, ifeel as a coward. Because when the police came back when i was 2a and they say we had some complaints about other child. With this particular individual . This particular individual. And i say, no. Are you sure . And i say, no. You lied . I lied. And at that moment i said im letting down so many other child. Thats why i think i wasnt ready mentally. But now i am ready and thats why i send this message, not me, its for the other kids. You should come out and you will feel better and those persons will stop abusing other child. Maybe it says something also about the nature of the dressing room, the mentality that footballers have to have. You cant really show vulnerability, you cant discuss your emotional troubles when you are at the elite level in a professional sport like football. But thats why im like, in football no one care about the mental health. Like, no one care. Is that true of you and your career . In italy, in manchester. All through my career you need to deliver. We are like toys, product, you need to perform, if you not feeling well. But you have different manager like alex ferguson, he would support right now, straight away, if i wasnt feeling well. Because youve got some managers that care about the player. But the club, in general, they not care about the player. If you not good enough, they going to buy another player. Lets talk about one other aspect of the pressures you are under. Being a black footballer, Facing Vial Outright racism. Perhaps most striking early in your career when you were in italy, when it wasnt even just coming from the stands, from the crowd, it was even coming from some of your own team mates. I think they have this habit to call you by your colour. They like to say because they use the term nero, black, it doesnt mean the n word. Its fine, i was like mum gave me a name, she didnt call me a colour, if you call me nero, i will call you white. It doesnt make any sense. I didnt let this happen. But also that story when i just learned and it was a man with his son and they look at me. I was like ok, im already famous. They come close to me and asked for a picture. I was surprised. And his son start touching my skin. He didnt understand, he think i was just dirty. Sometime i also call it ignorant and i was the only black player in all of sicily. Of course when i was 17 years old and people were throwing banana on my face, when i was playing, doing a monkey noise every time when i got the ball, but this was motivating me. You, certainly later in your career, took a stand. You werent prepared to accept it. The famous occasion was in 2011 when you are playing liverpool. Luis suarez use words which im not going to use but used words towards you which infuriated you, the referee intervened, it led to a big inquiry and it ended up with suarez being banned for a number of games. You then got a lot of hate from liverpool fans. Yeah. Was there at any point that you thought, you know, this is it worth it. Im standing up for what is right and i am getting so much trouble back that i might walk away from this. Im smiling but it wasnt funny on that time. I received threats and letters from people injail saying when we come out were going to cut your throat. Manchester united received so many letters, i had security for four months, 2a hours with the people were following my car. But when i was most disappointed was when i see the liverpool player, like you say, humming out on the pitch with support of luis suarez face. Thats when i was, something is wrong. Because actually i wasnt a victim anymore, i was just a liar and why i came out with that . So like you say, i wouldnt give up because im not a liar, this is what happened. I saw luis suarez when i played the Champions League final. I shake his hand. But racism is about education so we can talk about it many hours. Well, we will. One more thought which goes back to what we were discussing at the beginning about anger. There were times when for you it was about education, it wasnt about addressing the underlying causes of racism. Sometimes you did choose to fight. Ijust wonder, when you look back at the patrice evra who, late in your career when you were playing for marseilles and some of your fans at an away game in portugal were abusing you in using racial words, you snapped. You actually used physical violence. Yes, yes, because thats the way i grew up, thats the way i been built. I need to survive in the street. We are not prepared for that. Were from the street. Its not like i had any. You had a career in the game then. You are an experienced professional bull like that. Im a human being. Its not because i need to lead by example. Sometimes if you hurt me as my way to answer. Im not proud of it but every one have a dark side. Do you still have that in you today . That determination at some point to fight back, to use violence . No. No, but i will say no, but i dont know, if you put me in any circumstance, because i dont want to lie. And now, im in peace with myself, maybe also the trauma, i didnt ever speak out of many things, at peace so be really difficult for me to bring out that violence. What we see today is there are a generation of footballers that followed you who are perhaps more political on social media. They are more determined to stand up, to use their voices, to express their opinions. Partly thats seen in a collective action like taking the knee before games, tying themselves to the cause of the black lives matter movement. You in the past and spoken out against some of the gesture politics, saying that uefa, the european football body, when it was trying to get you involved in their respect in their kick out programmes. You didnt really believe in that stuff. Do you believe in taking the knee . Um, yes and no. Yes, because i like the fact when kids watch the game and you ask your mum and dad, why they doing this . Its their power to explain the reason theyre doing this. But is it going to change something . No. But i support any cause. Because i had enough of people pretending they want to stop against racism, theyre pretending. But when you touch their pocket, thats when they act. Thats why i had enough. So im for taking the knee, but if it is going to change, no. And we can change things, but i keep talking about that. A project didnt even start. I know. Lets take this slow. So youre tying the failure to act against racism to the money in football and to initiatives like the effort to create a super league for the elite clubs in europe . Im struggling to see the connection. I see the connection because i was so surprised the fact the way everyone was you need to stop it, they shut down the project. But the racism is for so many years and its not just football. You mean the will isnt there . To really tackle racism . Yeah, the real will is not there. I will tell you something really sensitive im not sure we should ban racist people. Because because which message they going to get . Theyre not going to learn. They can say, oh, we put them in a box because im racist, i get back. We need to understand the reason why. They tonight other friends that say, patrice, you know you my friend, but my daughter and my son will never beat with a black person because my dad on my grandparents want to accept it. So thats when i go back to the education. What do you think the Football Authorities could do now . Or is it more about what the Wider Society can do particularly for example, the social media platforms, the Huge Tech Companies who run these sites where abusive, vile, racist comments can be sent so very easily to professional footballers . Is it footballs problem or societys problem . Society, society. But i say football is a massive platform to spread a positive message for people to stop being racist. And were talking about social media. I will never ask any help to any social media because if you get abused, the easy solution is to not be on social media. Of course they have a way to block comment, to block people, but its one thing they need to explain to me is why we get about covid 19, we get a flag straight away. In the racist abuse, sometimes you feel they let racism spread on their platform. So they cant do something. Weve talked mostly about the clubs you played for, particularly Manchester United. But you are also a star for the French National team and i think of right and saying in the 2010 world cup you were ca ptaining your country. It didnt end well. It actually ended up with you and a whole bunch of other players on strike and banned from the National Team after the world cup. You have indicated that over years you experienced racism inside the French National setup. Why didnt you go public . Why didnt you walk away then . Thats a really good question. Because when you Play Football, youre just passionate about the game. You dont know whats behind all the politics. Of course i wanted to stop playing for the National Team for many reason. Because every time. But why did you agree to be captain . Because i was captain of my friends, not of my country. And thats why we strike for a player. Thats why i could, like, as a captain, say, no, we shouldnt strike. Because i didnt want to let my friend down. And thats why many people after that, they were in my face, they say, patrice, youre so stupid. Theyre going to bring back the guillotine just for you. But im like, im ok. Because im always all my life thinking about other people than myself. What kind of racist attitude did you encounter when you were representing france . We received a lot of racist letters. Even some people, they were pooing in a box, saying, go back to africa with your player. But i didnt found out those letters when i was playing. The only thing was when the french president of france was coming to visit us, we at a table where we were always sitting at the same place, so they were changing the chair to make sure it was two white players next to the president. And when i say that, everyone was like, what hes talking about . To they get to every picture and they found out that everything i was saying is real. Many black players, like, patrice, what is going on . I was like, guys, this is not our home, Play Football but youre never going to feel at home. When you look at the game today, you look at, for example, the way in which the world cup first of all is going qatar and then theres the idea we might play every two years, of that appears to be driven by money. You look at the Saudi Sovereign Wealth Fund taking over newcastle united, you look at even Manchester United, your team run by an American Billionaire family who have extracted vast amounts of money out of the Manchester United brand. Do you think greed is in danger of ruining football . Yes, of course. But it already ruined the football. Even im talking about the betting company. Now, people, they dont come in the stadium to support their team. They make sure they come because they want to win money. They boo us when i see some people that were like, patrice, even if you win 3 1, i bet were going to win three, to the goalkeeper next time you do a betterjob. Money is ruining everything. Football is for the poor people. Its like when you used to play in the street. But now we become a game for the rich people and they are ruining it. In a way, as i hear you talk, im thinking to myself, heres a professional footballer whos made a very good Living Out Of The Game whos basically telling me, you know what . Football really isnt that important and we are far too obsessed with it. Do you think we are . Yes. Ill be honest. If you told me, patrice, i wasnt happy playing football, im happy now. And you know, i would prefer if you asked me if i wasnt a footballer, i would be a doctor, i would wish to be a doctor to saving lives with up thats why i do on my social media and i received some comment, on my god, my dad just passed away. And i watched one of my two year videos you smile, you make me laugh. This is more important than winning the Champions League. You have kids. Yes. What if one of your kids had the talent and wanted to be a professional footballer, would you advise them against it given everything weve discussed in this interview . I would say, son, i hope youre ready because its a dark world, its a dark world. And thats what i say to every kid when they want to become a football player. I say its not about having the talent of Cristiano Ronaldo or messi, its here, you need to be strong mentally. When i signed for the French National team, i decide to play for the French National team and not for senegal. I didnt know it was political, i was just playing because its nice, i grew up in france, so the advice i would give them is if you can do something else, do it, but if you ready to receive a lot of bullet, like i did, do it. Its such a beautiful game out there. Patrice evra, we got you smiling at the end and i thank you very much indeed for being on hardtalk. Thank you. Youre welcome. Thank you for having me. Hello there. It was nearly 18 degrees celsius in cheshire yesterday, temperatures which are well above where they should be for this time of year. It will be mild again for the day ahead because weve got that south westerly wind off the atlantic, but with it, some rain. That rain is all tied in with this Weather Front here, which is pulsing if you like, bringing some further outbreaks of rain through the small hours and into the start of the day, and it will be on and off throughout the day. Its coming into high pressure, so its weakening, and to the north of it, the showers have been fading back to the coast with one or two around, but with clear skies actually it is turning chilly, A Touch Of Frost in rural areas. Whilst further south, temperatures of 11 and 12 are more like where they should be during the day at this time of year. But its misty, its murky, some patchy fog around across southern and eastern areas and there will be some hill and coastal fog underneath our Weather Front, which, as you can see, is going to bring some rain. Not too heavy, but really rather dank, misty and grey conditions through the day. But mild, 14s and 15s, whilst it should start to break up the cloud for Northern England tojoin in with Northern Ireland and scotland with just the odd shower and some sunshine. Still a brisk wind and more showers for the north and west of scotland. And indeed here, through the evening and overnight, well have another band of Showery Rain Moving Southwards Tending to weaken, butjust introduces a bit more cloud. So, perhaps the frost a little bit more patchy by the time we get to thursday morning. The cloud starting to break for the south because those Weather Fronts are rather weak and they are coming into this area of high pressure. So, well have, i think, a few fog issues as well on thursday morning. So, once those clear away, and at this time of year, both the coming morning and tomorrow morning, it will take its time to clear and it will linger through the rush hour. Once it does, some sunny spells, some rain is gathering on that southerly wind picking up further west, and you may have noticed this massive rain behind me. Thats all tied in with a developing area of low pressure. Here it is, theres a big Question Mark as to exactly where the wettest and the windiest weather will be. But this has the capability of bringing gales and quite a bit of rain with it to end the week. So, its one we will watch, do not take this as red because we will be fine tuning the details, but it looks as if it will be a mild end to the week because those winds coming off the atlantic, but it should be moving out of the way in time for the weekend with a weakening feature, so we will see quite a bit of dry weather but still quite a bit of cloud into the weekend. Bye for now. This is bbc news with the latest headlines for viewers in the uk and around the world. The eu accuses belarus of gangster Style Behaviour towards migrants as the crisis on the border with poland escalates. Did prince harry predict the January 6th Uprising in washington . New claims the duke of sussex warned the head of twitter 2a hours before the attack. A pandemic of the unvaccinated. The German Government explains why hospitals are close to being overwhelmed by Record Levels of covid. 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