Gaël Rivière would hardly have recognised the voices of his old friends from high school or university among the excited crowd that came out to support the French blind football team. No matter, whoever has swapped their suit and tie for shorts and a T-shirt knows they are in the stands. In recent weeks he has received a multitude of messages telling him that they would come to see him play. He is taking part in his third Paralympic Games after London and Tokyo.
After their first win against China (1-0) and then a defeat against Brazil (3-0) on Tuesday, the ‘Bleus’ will play their last preliminary match against Turkey on Wednesday 3 September, with a pass to the semi-finals at stake. grab.-final.
Gaël Rivière was born blind on Reunion Island thirty-four years ago. Six months later, the verdict was handed down: he would not be eligible for a cornea transplant. No matter, the little boy would be brought up like his sister and two brothers, two cousins that his parents adopted. “I was lucky to have parents who let me develop and didn’t overprotect me. I had a completely typical life for a child my age.” In 1998, the year of the World Cup in France, he was 8 years old and listened to the matches with fervor. Like many children of his generation, he also had a passion for Japanese animated television series, olive and tomwhich follows with delight.
It is therefore far from imagining that blind football exists. Created in the 1960s, the sport appeared in France in the mid-1980s, but did not make its debut at the Paralympic Games until 2004 in Athens. No matter, the little boy loves football and wants to play like his friends. He cleverly wraps the balloon in a plastic bag to hear the sound. “Soccer gradually became a passion. I don’t remember spending more than a day without kicking a ball between the ages of 9 and 15.”remember.
Passion for the law
Gaël Rivière was 15 years old when he wanted to be independent and left his village of Sainte-Anne (Réunion). With his parents’ consent, he left for Paris. Here he was a student at the Lycée Buffon and an intern at the National Institution for Blind Youth, where he discovered football for the blind. He made his first attempts with Hakim Arezki and Martin Baron, both also in the Blues.
At the age of 16, his skills opened the doors to the French blind football team. “At first I saw joining the team as an opportunity to play even more football. The desire to win, to play sport at a high level, came one or two years later, paradoxically when the first disappointments came.”remember. In 2007, the team narrowly missed out on qualifying for the Beijing Paralympics. “This type of failure builds a group and the desire to never experience this type of disappointment again”analyze.
You have 47.3% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.
