They have been the voice of the Blues and the great football nights of TF1 since 2016. Grégoire Margotton and Bixente Lizarazu will invite themselves to the television of millions of French people during this Euro, the second they will comment together after that of 2016 in France .
Before launching their competition with the opening match between Italy and Turkey, this Friday evening at 9 p.m., in Rome, the journalist and the former defender of the Blues recount their collaboration.
Would you say that you are friends?
BIXENTE LIZARAZU.
Our bond has grown to the point of becoming friendship.
There is mutual benevolence.
Everyone feels good.
Sometimes he can sense when I'm pissed off.
GRÉGOIRE MARGOTTON.
It's like a team during a big competition.
A guy can have a downside.
In this case, the other must be there to reassemble it.
I know a lot of duos of commentators who didn't necessarily get along, who played their game, then greeted each other politely until the next one.
However, we did not feel any tension on the air.
On the other hand, when you manage to create something that is not pretended, viewers end up feeling it.
I think this music is more pleasant to listen to.
BL
There are moments of complicity too.
After a match in Rostov-sur-le-Don (Russia), we arrive at the restaurant and we come across a dozen rather sturdy Russians.
We eat in our corner.
Across the street, the guys are singing vodkas.
They kept looking at us.
GM
It smelled like a trap.
We said to ourselves:
We accept a drink, no more, and we leave
.
BL
Okay, we took two.
These kind of strange moments, it linked us more than a game.
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What memories do you keep of your first Blues game?
GM
I remember it perfectly: a France-Cameroon in Nantes, before Euro 2016. It was not complicated to work together, because I have worked with about fifty consultants in my career.
It is a mechanism that is put in place.
BL
Everything happened naturally.
Everyone is in their place and respects that of the other.
We're just working on the match launches.
Greg briefs me on what to say, because the entry is important to him.
GM
We also know how to observe silences.
All it takes is this gesture
(Editor's note: it touches Lizarazu's knee)
and we are silent.
At first it was less obvious.
During France-Romania during the Euro, Dimitri Payet is replaced after scoring.
He is in tears, and I say:
We are going to take advantage of his exit to shut up, because it is magnificent
.
A second later, Bixente continues:
It's true that he had a good match!
BL Did
I do that
(Editor's note: he bursts out laughing)
?
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The match schedule to print
What's your best match?
GM
Like the Blues, we switched against Argentina in the round of 16 of the 2018 World Cup.
BL
Frankly, the matches that we had commented on so far in this World Cup were not great.
And against Argentina, everything was released.
GM
The best moment was after the game.
That never happens to us, but then we
thought
:
Hey, we were not bad today, right?
TF1 is a general public channel.
Do you keep it in mind when commenting?
GM
Today, I think 100% of beIN Sports or Canal + commentators could comment on TF1.
And 99% of consultants.
I just remove Habib Beye
(Editor's note: on Canal +)
, who is passionate about tactics and analysis.
On TF1, I never had the impression of being too sharp.
BL
I am just drunk by the too tactical vision of the evolution of a match. It is first of all an opposition between men. It's forgetting how important management can be. Sometimes we don't know that a player is going through a divorce or in mourning. This is what makes reading a meeting so much more complicated and exciting than the blackboard.