Lamine Ndiaye calls out Raymond Domenech…

May 24th, 2008 | by: Magnusson | Comments Off

A little background fact, Lamine Ndiaye, Senegalese National Team Manager, used to play with Mulhouse in the french second division with – then for – a player/coach named Raymond Domenech and even succeeded him at the helm of Mulhouse when said Domenech left for Lyon. lamine Ndiaye and Raymond Domenech have known each other for more than 25 years. And they don’t particularly like each other. And this situation doesn’t seem to be changing any time soon. Remember how Raymond Domenech decided to change his list from 29 to 30 and called up the young Bafétimbi Gomis to complete his list. Well, the pill is hard to swallow and in Dakar, Ndiaye is multiplying declarations and is not ready to forgive. Some would say he’s even threatening the french coach:

“I know Doemench well and I’m afraid he’s gonna make him play for five minutes before storing him in the attic. When I was playing under him , Raymond never wanted me to come play for the national Team. But since I’m hard headed, I would refuse to follow him and I would come ply anyway.”

According to an interview he gave to a senegalese radio station, Lamine Ndiaye believes that after having waited for a french call-up for years, Gomis seemed set on playing for Senegal and according to his club partner Bayal sall, started to make it known around Saint-Etienne. At nearly 23 and with the eclosion of younger players and/or more accustomed to the french selection than he (Benzema, Benarfa, Briand, Sinama-Pongolle, Saha, etc…) he believed he would never be considered. Which is when Senegal started thinking seriously about him. According to Lamine Ndiaye, his presence in the list is not innocent:

“It’s not for nothing that Raymond Domenech, who had provided a list of 29 players, has finally decided to change it to 30. I’m afraid he only added Bafetimbi Gomis to make sure he would not be joining the Senegalese National Team.”

This story will not be ending soon since the French Federation has supposedly contacted FIFA to make sure that the case of Issiar Dia is sorted out (they could actually just write the consent form, but they won’t, making it nearly impossible for Issiar to play against Algeria). We’ll see what comes next.

I think both sides should calm down. If it goes any further, we should be able to take back Patrick Vieira, Patrice Evra and any one of the Diarras.
Another advice for Lamine Ndiaye, make sure this doesn’t happen with Lamine Sakho of PSG, David Bellion, and countless other young players of senegalese descent.