Varane reveals he spoke personally to Benfica star | OneFootball

José Mourinho managed to convince Raphaël Varane of his quality right from their very first conversation. The French central defender was coached by the current Benfica manager at Real Madrid, and gave an interview to the Spanish newspaper ‘As’, where he spoke about that period.

“I was at my mother’s house studying when the phone rang. It rang so much at that time that I didn’t even pay attention to who was on the other end. I just thought ‘another one…’ Suddenly, it was Zidane,” began Varane, who was only 18 years old when he moved from Lens to Real Madrid.

The French defender continued: “I was really startled. I asked him if we could talk another time, because I was busy, and he said – elegantly, as always – that yes, it was no problem. I ran to tell my brother what had happened and then called him back.”

“Before signing, I traveled to Madrid and spoke personally with Mourinho, because I wanted to know if he really wanted me. He has a lot of charisma. I left saying: ‘I’ll kill myself for this man’,” Raphaël Varane later explained, about his first conversation with the current Benfica coach – who also spoke about the French defender recently.

Finally, Varane addressed the end of his career, which came recently at the age of 31: “Back in 2013, I tore my external meniscus, which is the most complicated one. I had surgery and they removed 72% of that meniscus. I couldn’t fully extend or bend my leg, to protect my knee joints. I always played in pain. In my knee, in my Achilles tendon, in my back… Even now, when I play sports, I feel pain. Doing sports is very good for your health, but high-level competition is not.”

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.