EXCLUSIVE | Djibril Cissé on Hugo Ekitike: ‘I wasn’t expecting him to be so good, so soon.’ | OneFootball

Djibril Cissé began his playing career at AJ Auxerre, emerging from their famed academy before representing Liverpool FC, Olympique de Marseille, and becoming a France international. The former striker is back at Auxerre as the club’s offensive coach and sat down with Get French Football News to discuss his current role, Hugo Ekitike’s move to Liverpool, and Marseille’s ambitions.

Last season was a bit of a revival for Auxerre. How important has it been for the club to be back in the top flight?

It’s really important for AJ Auxerre to be in Ligue 1, even for the city itself, for the people, and the businesses. In terms of the club’s history, yeah, Auxerre, it’s a part of the top flight of French clubs. And to be honest, being in Ligue 1 is absolutely normal for us.

How would you assess the start to the season so far? And what areas are you looking to improve on?

Offensively, we are good. We’re creating a lot of chances. We have to be more clinical in terms of scoring goals. And we are conceding a little bit too much to win games, or even to draw. And yeah, we need to work on that. But to be honest, it’s only eight games, we still have time to improve things, [but] we can’t wait too long, because points fly [away]. We’re in 15th, so we need to improve that. I’m really confident with the squad we have. We have talent in the team, we have good players, and I think we have something to do this season.

One particularly exciting player is Danny Namaso. He mentioned that you played an important role in convincing him to come to the club. Can you tell us a bit about what you said to him?

I was clear and honest. I told him that he’s a great player, but that he needs to work on some parts of his game, which are his finishing, how to use his skills, and how to be more relaxed sometimes. We’re talking, I don’t want to say every day, but we speak quite often. I’m only two or three days in Auxerre, and I carry on my job on the phone with them. He’s a great player. I like to work with him because he’s asking things, he wants to improve, he wants to work, and I like to have players like this. And on top of this, he’s really talented.

Another talented player you’re working with, Sékou Mara, has had a difficult few years since leaving Bordeaux for Southampton. How are you helping him refind his form?

He left Bordeaux. He’s had a spell in Strasbourg. He’s a typical number nine, holding the ball, turning, and shooting. I like these kinds of players because they’re a genre of player that we’ve lost, a real number nine; they’re hard to find now. He’s another guy who really asks for things, who wants to improve, who wants to be a better player. And I love to work with people like this because they are always open, [they] really listen to what I’m saying, and I see improvement every week. I’m really happy to have players like this, and we can include Lassine Sinayoko and Ibrahim Osman. The full squad wants to improve; they know there is a lot of quality in the squad, but we have things to improve, and they want to work and change a lot of things to get better, and it’s what I like.

Could you explain what Hugo Ekitike brings to this Liverpool squad?

He brings goals [laughs]. He can score goals. He showed it in Germany, and he’s shown it at Liverpool when he arrived. I was a little scared that he wasn’t going to play much, but I was wrong. He’s playing, he’s doing good, he’s scoring goals. He’s bringing different options to Mo Salah and Alexander Isak. He’s a really good player. I know him from France. I knew he had the quality to perform, but to be honest, I wasn’t expecting him to be that good, that quick.

Arne Slot has managed to juggle Ekitike and Alexander Isak’s playing time so far. Do you see this continuing, or will one of them become the main striker?

I think if Ekitike stays at this level and continues to score goals when he has the chance to play, then it’s going to be difficult for the manager to choose, but that’s football, that’s the beauty of football. The season is long, but as long as Liverpool have a striking force that scores goals and wins games, Salah can have a down period, so Ekitike can help. You need all your strikers at the top for the entire season, and it’s a good thing to have strikers who score goals.

Liverpool have been in a poor run of form [losing the last three matches in all competitions]. How do they get out of it?

You get out of situations like this by staying together, by keeping focus on your target. The talent is there, and they know how to play; sometimes things don’t go your way, but you have to stay positive and focus on what you have to do and not listen to what people say. People are going to try and hurt the mentality and the environment of the squad. You have to be deaf to all of this and to carry on working and keeping focus.

And before you go, do you see your former club, Marseille, challenging Paris Saint-Germain for the title this year?

Yeah, to be honest. I say this every season because I’m a Marseille fan. But this season, we have a really good squad, and the team looks stronger than last year – even if it’s going to be difficult to do better than last year – we lost a few players, we lost Rabiot, who was our key player. But [we got] Igor Paixão, who is a really good. Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang came back. People had some doubts about his abilities, but a striker is a striker; when you know how to score goals, you can score goals in Saudi Arabia, you can score goals everywhere. He’s a top player. Pierre-Emile Højbjerg in the middle. Gerónimo Rulli, in goal, he’s really good. I think it’s the season to be optimistic; it’s now.

Djibril Cissé was speaking exclusively to GFFN on behalf of Poker Strategy.

GFFN | Nick Hartland