Stillness and Speed: My Story (21 page)

Zidane, in the 2006 World Cup quarter-final, destroyed Brazil with something quite different. It’s one of the games that defines him and looking at it again I realised that often when
he juggled the ball or flicked it over a Brazilian head, he then just played a little sideways pass. It didn’t contribute to the game in the way you’re talking about. But he’s
killing Brazil all the same. He’s showing them: ‘This is your thing but I do it better than you.’ He breaks them psychologically. You never did that.

‘That’s true and it comes from me being a team player. I have individual skills, but those skills are based on the idea there has to be an end product. Someone has to be on the end
of my pass, of my move, or my one-two or whatever it is. That’s what’s in my mind. But I’ve never been a guy for one against one or a trick. Never.’

Nor one for dribbling from your own half like a Maradona?

‘I don’t believe in that. In my mind a great player is a player who will give something extra to the team. He can be a defender, a midfielder. Or he can be in my position. I am a
player who gives something extra to the team by assists or setting other players free. I scored many goals, but by the end of my career I had more assists. And, not just assists but
perfect
assists.’

Thierry said he loves to give an assist when he knows he could score himself – and, when his team-mate scores, he sees the joy in his face and knows he made someone happy. He said:
‘For me, scoring a goal is amazing, but nothing beats that . . . making someone happy.’ I’m guessing you feel like that?

‘I got so much pleasure from that! It’s unbelievable what goes into it. First, of course, there’s your ability. But you also need the understanding of the other players. Do
they understand what I’m trying to do? At Arsenal we didn’t have that in the first season but slowly, slowly they got to understand me. That means stepping up their own game. They
think: “Oh wait a minute, this brings more to the game. He can do things.” But I had to adjust myself as well, and that was a great process.

‘The other thing you need is imagination. That’s so important. Not just imagination from me but imagination from the players around me. You can compare it with the receiver and the
quarterback in American football. Sometimes the camera from behind shows there is nothing there. Then the quarterback throws the ball and then slowly you see the picture expand. It’s like a
puzzle. Finally, where he’s thrown the ball, you see the catcher move to receive it. That’s a little bit like what I was doing. You need the pace on the ball, and both of you have to
have the vision. In American football, of course, everything is about patterns and they practise it day-in day-out. But in football you can’t practise. It’s not like you have a timeout
and the boss says: “OK Dennis, we’re going to do this pattern and Patrick is coming this way . . .” It has to come up within the game. You don’t know how their defence will
be, either. But you see two or three defenders and you know what they’re going to do in two or three seconds. You have to know that Patrick is moving, and then you make sure there’s the
right pace on the ball, and he’s not offside. And the timing has to be right, and you have to get all angles and the maths correct . . . But I always liked that sort of precision. It’s
like solving the puzzle.’

As a small boy you were fascinated by geometry. Your mum told us you spent happy hours measuring angles and lengths and doing precise little drawings of triangles, semi-circles and
rhomboids. Do you think any of your old school exercise books still exist?

‘I don’t think so. Why do you ask?’

Maybe we could see in the drawings the beginnings of your later understanding of the pitch?

‘I don’t think so and, anyway, it’s just a small part of it. Geometry is what I like, of course. It’s certainly a passion. Maybe it’s my biggest passion. But there
are so many other things: the pace of the ball, the touch. It’s not only down to maths. In football it worked out well for me, but is it geometry? It’s also the pleasure of knowing what
other people can do and are going to do.’

So it’s more telepathy than geometry?

‘You read my mind.’

13

W
HAT MOTIVATES YOU
, Dennis?

‘I think about this a lot, especially now I’m a coach. You see players who have a hunger to succeed because they had a difficult childhood. You know, people often say: “You
have to be down in the gutter to understand what it means in life.” You’re always thinking about which of the young players has the drive to have a great career. As a coach you’re
looking for that hunger. I know I had that drive. But where does it come from? That I don’t know.’

You weren’t in the gutter.

‘No, no, not at all. I had a very secure, happy childhood. We could just about manage. Maybe you could say: “Then money is my drive.” But it isn’t.’

Is it just passion? Is it something within yourself? You’re very shy and modest, but deep down inside you want to be the best in the world and that’s your goal, your aim . .
.

‘That’s me. Sometimes you hear of people having drive because their parents divorced. My parents weren’t divorced. Perhaps it was significant that we didn’t have much
money when I was a child. It doesn’t explain my drive, but maybe it formed me in some way. Perhaps it made me feel that if you have a chance you go for it, and keep going for it. I really
don’t know. I know my feeling but I’m not sure where it comes from, if it’s character, if it’s childhood . . .’

What do you look for in the youngsters you coach now?

‘Well, you see straightaway who has drive. But it can come from different things. Let’s say this kid wants to be a millionaire when he’s eighteen. That’s drive. Is it
bad? “By twenty-eight I want to have three sports cars and the only way to get them is to win trophies and play good football.” If that’s his conclusion, maybe it’s OK. But
if he thinks: “I’m making one million each year now and if I play for five years I’ve got five million and that’s it, I can retire,” that’s different. Or
“I’ll stay in the reserves and just keep training as long as I can put gas in my Lamborghini.” I’m not sure that’s drive at all. It’s not a passion from the
soul. And that’s what you’re looking for: the real passion that comes from inside.’

What about the drive of the artist, where you don’t have a choice: you have to do it, and do it your way, like the musician has a passion to make music and the painter has to paint.
You need to express what is inside you . . .

‘Yes.’

. . . and, in the end, perhaps the striving to improve becomes almost spiritual. Patrick Vieira says that with you it is both artistic and spiritual.

‘Well, you set yourself goals, targets. And once you’ve got there you want to move on and go further. You keep raising the bar, and therefore it’s never good enough. You want
perfection. It’s never good enough but it’s within your reach. You climb one mountain and see the higher one. And I want to do it, I want to do that. That’s probably what people
have. But I like what you say that it’s a passion – something within the soul, isn’t it? It’s deeper. Whereas ambition, for money or whatever, is more calculating. It can be
satisfied. But passion is . . . no . . . you keep . . . you want to grab it. You do the hard thing, always go for the difficult thing, and then you have to go for the next thing.’

Because it would be a betrayal of your deepest self not to do it in that way?

‘Right.’

A
RSENE
W
ENGER HAS
an interesting view about this. He says: ‘It is a spiritual thing. I am convinced of that. I believe you
have two kinds of players who play football. Those who want to serve football like you serve God, and they put football so high that everything that is not close to what football should be is a
little bit non-acceptable. And then you have those who use football to serve their ego. And sometimes the ego can get in the way of the game, because their interest comes before the interest of the
game. Sometimes the big ego is linked with what we call strong personalities, charisma
.
But most of the time, what people call charisma, is just big ego. I believe that Dennis was one of
those who had such a high idea of the game and such a respect for the game that he wanted that to be above everything. I believe that the real great players are guided by how football should be
played, and not by how football should serve them. If it becomes spiritual, it’s endless, and you’re always driven to going higher, and getting closer to what you think football should
be.’

Then Wenger gives the example of a player who knows he ought to pass but takes a massive gamble and scores. ‘If he really loves the game he’ll go home and worry about it. He’ll
know he really should have passed to set up an easy chance for someone else. But he was selfish and got lucky. If he doesn’t care about the game he’ll go home and think: “That was
great – I’ll do the same next time.”’ And he says that’s the difference. ‘That’s why you have to teach the kids to respect the game, and treat the game a
little bit like a religion, that is above you, where you want to serve the game.’

* * *

W
OULD YOU TALK
about this sort of stuff with Arsène?

Dennis: ‘I remember when Arsene talked about players, sometimes he’d say: “Oh no, he doesn’t love the game . . .” This is quite a big statement from him. But I know
exactly what he means. There are some players who, as soon as the whistle went at the end of training . . .
boom!
. . . They went inside, got changed, then straight in the car and away.
But the real
liefhebbers
(the literal translation is ‘love-havers’, the guys who really have love for the game) stayed behind to practise. And not only players. David Dein and
Massimo Moratti are people who really love the game too. At Arsenal it was always the same players, eight or nine, who stayed behind to work after training. And I guarantee if you do that
you’ll become a better player.’

I love the idea of a small group of exceptional guys all competing with each other and pushing each other. Artists and intellectuals in 15th century Florence did that and gave us the
Renaissance. At Arsenal you end up as The Invincibles. So I’m picturing this group of players, all talented in different ways, sometimes perhaps rivals, and all stimulating and provoking each
other. I’m guessing that to do well in this team, you have to be one of the players who stay on after training?

‘Well, yes. That’s part of it.’

And the ones who prefer to go home immediately leave?

‘In the end, yes. I must say I don’t have a real memory of who was who, and there were players who sometimes joined and sometimes didn’t . . . but there were always eight or
nine players who joined.’

Freddie Ljungberg would stay?

‘Well, yeah. And Thierry was always there. Robert Pires would stay. Others would stay and go to the gym, which is working as well.’

And you competed with each other?

‘That as well. It’s part of being a successful team. But I like what you said about pushing each other, challenging each other, in training as well.’

Bob Wilson said the old English approach was to teach young players to give the simple pass so that the receiver could deal with it easily. But you found that annoying. When you arrived at
Arsenal you told everyone: ‘Don’t give me these soppy little passes, give me fast, hard balls because I can deal with anything that comes at me and playing faster is playing better. By
the time Pires and Ljungberg are in the team, a few years later, it’s moved on a long way, it’s at a much higher level.

‘Yes, always give me a strong pass because I want to challenge myself by controlling a difficult ball. You have to keep pushing and testing each other. Like you test your pace and strength
against Sol Campbell. He’s your team-mate, but in training you’re against him. If you can beat Sol, who can’t you beat in the Premier League? And if he can stop me or he can stop
Thierry Henry, who can’t he stop in the Premier League? That’s the challenge: always trying to improve yourself. But it can only work when everyone is giving one hundred per cent. Like
having goalies who try in training. At Inter they didn’t try and it was so frustrating. But Jens Lehmann? David Seaman? Fantastic! Jens couldn’t stand to have a single shot go past him.
And if I tried to lob David Seaman . . .
woaah!
If it worked, it was a fantastic goal and he was like: “Great, well done.” But if it didn’t work out, he got hold of the
ball and smashed it two hundred yards away! He’d just kick it away and say “Get that!” and I’d have to go and get it. David is a nice soft guy – but not when he plays.
That was his drive: “You’re not going to fool me! Now get that ball!” I loved that attitude.’

There seems to be a critical mass. You have to get a certain number of people doing this, all with their different motivations and talents. Get the right number of the right kind of people
together and somehow it works.

‘It starts somewhere. Maybe, as the players say, it started with me because I was like that. I wanted to give everything and when training was finished I would go on and I would keep
practising and going and going . . . and suddenly there’s goalkeepers staying on as well, saying: “Wait a minute, I’m going to have some of that.” And then others would stay
behind, too. But it’s not like it wasn’t done before I came. I am sure if you look at any successful team, and you look at their week in training, it would be like that. When
you’ve got players staying behind and playing with a smile, they don’t get tired. Do they smile because they play well in the matches? Or is it the other way round, that they play well
in the matches because they stay behind?

‘Look at Messi. There was a game last year where Barcelona were winning five-nil and the coach took him off and he was furious. “But the game is won!” “I don’t
care! I love playing. Don’t rest me.” When they score the fifth goal you see the whole team enjoying it. I can imagine that team in training just having fun. They love the game. They
really enjoy it, they love passing the ball or putting it in the net or doing some tricks. And you can pick out the ones who would say . . . “Oh, I’m going in now” . . . and the
ones who say: “No, I’m staying behind.”’