tiré du Guardian
The kick that stunned football
Selhurst Park, 25 January 1995, 9.00pm. The most enigmatic, charismatic footballer in England aims the most shocking, unforgettable and undeniably glamorous kick of the decade - at a fan. Brian Oliver reports on the lasting impact of that lunge while Cantona, his victim and a full supporting cast recall the night
Sunday October 31, 2004
The Observer
Think back to the 1980s - Bradford, Heysel, Hillsborough, Thatcher, hooligans, ID cards - and it is easier to understand why the 1990s was the most important decade for football in this country since the Football League was founded in the 1880s. As spectators were treated less like animals and more like human beings, most, though by no means all of them, began to behave better. Businesses invested in the game. The Premier League was created, the Champions League, too, and Sky's TV money changed a local, provincial game into something altogether different. A new audience was attracted to football; crowds grew year after year, from 20,000 per match in the top division to more than 30,000.
Football became more than a game, and there will be no turning back. Whether this is a good or a bad thing is open to question. It happened.
There are half a dozen images that define this decade of change, which help to show why football widened its appeal. First, and most important, is the sight of Paul Gascoigne crying into his England shirt after being booked in the 1990 World Cup semi-final against West Germany. Unaggressive and emotional, a billboard image that helped to start an apparently unstoppable surge in popularity for the national team.
'Poor Gazza - the human side of football' was the unwritten caption, even if poor England made his tears irrelevant by losing on penalties. There followed, in the next eight years, memorable front-page images of poor Gary, poor Gareth, and poor David. Lineker was substituted in his last England appearance in Euro 92, Southgate's miss led to another shoot-out defeat against the Germans in the Euro 96 semi-final, and Beckham was sent off for kicking the Argentine Diego Simeone in the 1998 World Cup, in another game that England would lose on penalties.
It took a while for Beckham to win the sympathy vote, but he got there in the end. As did the grey shirts of Bayern Munich, who provided one of the two unforgettable images from club football in the 1990s: their defenders flat out in tears after conceding two goals in the last minute of the 1999 Champions League final, which Manchester United won to become the first, and to date only, English champions of Europe since the arrival of 'new football'.
The other abiding image from club football is the violent and truly shocking picture of Eric Cantona leaping over an advertising hoarding to kick Crystal Palace fan Matthew Simmons at Selhurst Park on 25 January 1995. Cantona had just been sent off, Simmons came down 11 rows to tell him to 'Fuck off back to France, you French motherfucker', or 'French bastard' depending on whose version you accept. Cantona crossed a line no player had crossed before in English football: he attacked a fan.
There was a fascination in this Hollywood moment that goes into the dark world of 'the glamour of violence' as a recent book on boxing by Kevin Mitchell was subtitled. Cantona's kick was unquestionably glamorous: because it was Cantona (dressed all in black), because it was Manchester United, because it had never happened before, because it was so shocking.
Was there sympathy for Cantona? Never, judging by the media coverage of what Trevor Brooking, among others, described as 'the most horrendous incident involving a player I have ever witnessed at an English football ground'.
The most commonly used adjective in the coverage of Cantona's assault, and the subsequent court case and nine-month ban from football imposed on the Frenchman, was 'shameful'. As the 10th anniversary of 'kung-fu Cantona' draws near, it is tempting to look back and ask: shameful for whom?
To Cantona and his club, certainly. He deserved his lengthy ban. But apart from three or four articles, and most notably a column by Jimmy Greaves in the Sun, nobody in the national press asked the most important question of all: why? Why had it happened?
The who, what, where and when of the Selhurst Park incident were detailed in many thousands of words and the widespread conclusion was that Cantona should be banned for life from 'the game that's dying of shame'. But why, apart from the obvious loss of self-control, did Cantona do something quite so outrageous?
'We've heard a lot about Cantona's responsibilities,' Greaves wrote. 'What about analysing the responsibility of Simmons and every foul-mouthed yob who thinks his £10 admission gives him the right to say what he likes to a man... to abuse, taunt, spit and behave in a way that would get you locked up if you repeated it in the high street.'
Tom Carty, who was at the match, is one of the senior figures in the British advertising industry and has worked with Cantona, whom he describes as 'a warm, kind, genuine, creative man, a thinker', on film shoots. He believes some good came of the kick.
'It made people think twice about how they behave, about abusing a player,' he says. 'The behaviour of some fans was so bad, so tribalistic. There was so much hate. If Simmons had stayed in his seat, no one would ever have questioned his behaviour, but it needed questioning.
'Just imagine if a black player had done that in the 1970s - someone like Clyde Best when they were chucking bananas at him. There would have been a riot. But it would have changed the way people behaved, some good would have come of it. Maybe that's what happened with Cantona.'
There are those, particularly in south London, who believe Cantona got off lightly, that the Manchester United PR machine made racism an issue when it was not. John Barnes was never part of the Old Trafford spin machine. Here's his view in 2004: 'It's very ironic that it took a white Frenchman to bring home to the nation the issue of racism in football.'
· Brian Oliver is sports editor of The Observer
The assaillant
What on earth made him do it? Eric Cantona tells Darren Tulett just what he was thinking, how he would have reacted completely differently on any other day - and why movies are exactly like football
Sunday October 31, 2004
The Observer
Barefoot and bearded, his long hair swept back, Eric Cantona strides towards me in a red beach-football kit, his imposing physique seeming to fill the corridor of the Paris arena where soon he will receive the biggest ovation of this star-filled night. Seven years after abruptly ending his playing career at the age of 31, he has lost nothing of the brooding presence that helped make him such an unpredictable success in England with football fans and marketing men alike. The Frenchman, still wearing the No 7 from his Manchester United heyday, has charisma but also an edge of menace.
'How are you?' he says, in English, and offers me his hand. He knows I speak French but continues in English for a few more minutes, his eyes flickering nervously around the enclosed space of the corridor.
He still doesn't like to talk about what happened at Selhurst Park. When pushed, he rejects the term 'karate kick' as a description for his attack on Matthew Simmons. 'There was a barrier between us so I had to jump over it,' he says now. 'That's all, otherwise I might have just steamed in with my fists. You know, you meet thousands of people like him [Simmons]. And how things turn out can hinge on the precise moment you run into them. If I'd met that guy on another day, things may have happened very differently even if he had said exactly the same things. Life is weird like that. You're on a tightrope every day.
'The most important thing for me is that I was who I was. I was myself! I don't think you can plan on when you're going to lose it, or anything like that. What matters when you do lose it, for a good or bad reason, is to try to understand why you do things. But life can be so complicated. Even if you understood why you did something, it doesn't mean you won't go and do the same thing again tomorrow. The best thing you can do is to take a step back and laugh at yourself. A bit of self-derision.'
Cantona was intent on 'being myself, who I was' at the court case that followed the kick, on 23 March, too. Cantona and Paul Ince, the United captain at Selhurst Park that night who had been involved in a melee with supporters in the seconds following Cantona's kick, were both charged with assault.
'We stayed at the Croydon Park hotel,' Ince remembers. 'So we got up in the morning and I've got me suit on - the nuts, know what I mean? I knock on Eric's door and he's standing in jacket, white shirt, long collars like that [he gestures to describe long, pointed collars], unbuttoned so you can see his chest. "Eric, you can't go to court like that", I told him and he says, "I am Cantona, I can go as I want". So he got in the dock and he got 14 days in prison. I thought, "Oh my god, it must be that shirt. It has to be the shirt, Eric." '
Ince pleaded not guilty and was later cleared. But Cantona, who was convicted there and then, was taken to the cells where he was held for three hours until he was released on bail pending appeal. 'There was always going to be massive [media] coverage because it was Eric Cantona,' Ince continues. 'I mean, you've seen things - clips in Brazil and Argentina when players have got sticks and they're whacking people, bang! But people don't know them so it doesn't go worldwide. But because it was Eric Cantona it was the biggest thing ever. It's a shame because people forget what a great player he was and what a great ambassador he was.'
Cantona's sentence was reduced to 120 hours' community service on appeal. He was also banned by the Football Association for nine months and stripped of the France captaincy. It was at this point that he uttered his now infamous statement that 'when the seagulls follow the trawler it is because they think sardines will be thrown into the sea'. This 'cryptic' comment was plainly a reference to the constant media harassment.
What might have led to the end of one career actually opened the door to another. Film director Etienne Chatillez cast him and brother Joël in Le Bonheur est dans le Pré. Cantona was once mocked for daring to admit to a fondness for poetry and painting - not considered normal behaviour for a footballer - but the cinema is now his passion. After acting in five feature films and making his directorial debut with a short film based on a Charles Bukowski story, he is now preparing his second film behind the camera. It will be 'about paranoia', he says.
He likens directing to being a football coach. 'It's exactly the same thing. There is a way of instilling confidence in people. There is a story: knowing what we're going to do together, what our goal is. Directors and coaches both have to get the best out of different personalities, make sure everyone gives of his best for the team. For the same objective, the same goal. Yes, it's exactly the same job.'
One man who has worked with Cantona believes he will go on to direct a feature film. Tom Carty, a United fan who was at the Palace match, has written and directed popular screen ads - Guinness, Pepsi Max, Nike - and has been on set with Cantona twice. 'All he wanted to talk about was film,' says Carty. 'I'm sure he has the talent. He is multifaceted: the artist, poet ... he's creative, unlike your average one-dimensional English footballer. A normal player, an English player, if they had crossed the line like that, attacked a fan, they would have just punched him. Not Eric. There was elegance in what he did. Because of the way people behaved at the time, Matthew Simmons knew he would get away with it. But, with his reaction, Cantona showed him: "You know what? Hang on a minute, you can't do that. I'm changing the rules".'
Eric Cantona was born in Paris in 1966. Thirty years later, United's merchandise department would turn in a tidy profit selling T-shirts emblazoned with the words: '66 was a great year for English football. Eric was born'. His father, a psychiatric nurse, was the son of a Sardinian immigrant and the family soon moved south to Marseille. By all accounts, the Cantona home here was simple and modest. Growing up, Eric became a regular visitor to Olympique Marseille's Stade Vélodrome.
He made his professional debut at 16 with Auxerre, the club in the small Burgundy town. It was also while with Auxerre that he met his future wife, Isabelle, sister of a team-mate, Bernard Ferrer.
His turbulent playing career was marred by clashes with authority, his erratic behaviour and candour quickly marking him out as a 'bad boy'. As an Auxerre player he was banned from international football after calling the then France coach, Henri Michel, 'un sac à merde' . Not long after that, he was sacked by Marseille when he threw his shirt to the ground in protest at being substituted in a friendly. He was suspended for fighting a team-mate at Montpellier. He quit football for a first time in 1991 after a two-month ban from the French league. His crime? As captain of Nîmes, he had thrown the ball at a referee. When he was banned for a month, Cantona told every member of the disciplinary committee that they were fools. The ban was doubled.
He didn't stay away from the game long. Tempted to England for a trial at Sheffield Wednesday, he was signed by Leeds United in February 1992 and in little more than a dozen games catapulted them to league champions - and himself to star status. But only nine months after arriving at Elland Road, he went to Old Trafford in a £1.2m transfer. In his first season there - the inaugural Premiership season - he ended up as a champion again.
Franck Sauzée, who played alongside him at Marseille and for France, says Cantona was an easy target for the authorities. 'Eric always had character and principles and stood up for himself and for others. Most players will tell you he was an adorable guy to have in your team and, unlike many forwards, selfless. The football world doesn't like players who speak out, though.'
Rebellious, maybe, but 'he was a lovely, lovely man', says Ince. 'We were probably closer than most people, me, Eric and Giggsy [Ryan Giggs]. We used to spend a lot of time together, go out for a few drinks together. It was always all about him, the way he walked in, his charisma.
'He was one of the best, perhaps the best, I've played with. It was his awareness. He seemed to know where anyone was on the pitch at any given time when he had the ball. He used to say to me, "Treat a ball like you treat a woman. Caress it". I'd say, "I'd kick the ball over the fucking bar! I couldn't kick my wife over the bar". He just loved the ball, didn't he? His little touches, flicks... he was just unbelievable. A fantastic player and a lovely, lovely person, the most gentle gentleman.'
An hour after our first meeting, his team having been soundly beaten by the beach-football world champions from Brazil, Cantona re-emerges from the shower. It is soon apparent that defeat still hurts and he needs to put it into context. 'The European season finished a month ago, while the Brazilians are in full swing,' he explains. 'And then these gala games are fine to help promote beach football, but it's not the same as a competitive match. There's something false about it. The difference is like that between an actor playing out a scene and someone living it in real life. Real things are always better.'
Cantona and his brother, Joël, promote beach football. 'I do it because I enjoy it,' he says. 'For fun. We're at the beginning of this sport and it's exciting to be involved. If I can help through my name, all the better. People often come along to see the oldies, but they leave talking about the young talent. That's fine by me, I'm not jealous.'
He has no reason to be. Though his United days are long gone and his cinematic efforts have divided critics, the 7,000 crowd in the French capital rose as one to acclaim him when he ran out for the game.
'I'm happy when I see people who are happy to see me,' he says. 'But just as many people dislike me, I'm sure. The thing is, those who like me are the ones who bought tickets and they wanted to show their affection, perhaps. The important thing is to be yourself. It's important not to seek to please people for the sake of it, to play to the crowd. People know if you are trying too hard to please, or faking it.'
Cantona is at his most animated when I mention Alex Ferguson, even though he concedes he is not up to date with all the latest news from the world of football. 'I don't exactly steer clear of football these days, but I only watch a match on TV if I stumble upon it,' he says almost apologetically. 'But when I think football, I think Manchester United. I go over to see a game at Old Trafford from time to time. Talk of their decline just makes me laugh. Manchester United are still Manchester United. A truly exceptional club. They may be the richest in the world and of course they can and do buy star players from time to time, but the emphasis is still on training kids. In today's world, where we manufacture stars in five minutes on reality TV shows, that commitment takes on more meaning for me. Educating youngsters, putting in the time, remains the priority at United, and even today Alex Ferguson knows the names of all the trainees. That's what makes me believe there is a belle philosophie at the club.'
What of the rumours suggesting Cantona is preparing to return to the club in some sort of coaching capacity? He wouldn't rule it out, but it's not going to happen tomorrow. 'I know lots of people at the club - Alex, Carlos [Queiroz, the assistant manager] and some of the players, of course. They don't need any help. I think they have the people they need right now.'
Cantona has little time to spare anyway, what with beach football and the movies. He has a new film coming out next year, and is already working on his 'paranoia' short.
As he prepares to depart, Cantona pauses and says: 'In football I went as high as I could, then I stopped. As far as acting is concerned, I'm still at the start of my career. I have always had a thirst for learning, and I know that as an actor I have progress to make. I know that I have a face, a look, people aren't used to seeing. A presence. That's what's saved me and is why people are still prepared to offer me roles. I'm lucky. Without it I may never have been given a chance. I have had to accept that and try to acquire a little bit of confidence.
'I am shy. Sometimes it's tough being shy and I feel a bit paranoid. I need to feel the support of my director, otherwise I can feel like an idiot.'
Cantona has had to build a relationship with the camera. Tempted to overact at first, he says he now blocks out all other thoughts in an attempt to connect with the lens, be it cinematic or photographic. Being subjugated to the camera can make a man reveal his 'most vulnerable side', he says.
This thought brings to mind our first encounter of the evening, when he walked almost menacingly along the corridor only to announce himself with a timid, softly spoken greeting. The image of a strutting, aloof, barrel-chested Cantona, upturned collar and all, that pertains from his remarkable time at United, represents only one side of this strange and mysterious man.
'You can often overdo it, overact, when you lack confidence,' he confides. 'When I have a camera pointing at me, I try to empty my head, drift off into surrealist thoughts. Then the camera can pick up something that is closer to instinct. More natural. Subconscious even. I try to get into that almost unconscious state where you are no longer trying to prove something, to show something. That's not what the camera likes. The camera needs to penetrate. It's better when your regard [expression] is more of a breath, your respiration. You open up and can see and be seen. I believe the camera penetrates you. Penetrates your very soul. I have learnt that over time. You have to be penetrated. Voilà !'
· Darren Tulett is a presenter with Canal Plus. Additional reporting by Jamie Jackson
The target
At first Matthew Simmons was seen as a victim, then reviled as a racist. Now, in his only interview before the anniversary of 'the incident', he tells Jamie Jackson he's ashamed - but wants an apology
Sunday October 31, 2004
The Observer
Matthew Simmons is sitting in a hotel bar in Croydon, south London, reflecting on the night at Selhurst Park that changed his life for ever. In the immediate aftermath of Cantona's attack on him, Simmons became one of the most recognisable and reviled men in Britain: he lost his job, family members ignored him and reporters pursued him.
'I was in the wrong place at the wrong time,' he says now, then draws a diagram in my notepad to show where he was sitting that night and exactly what happened after Cantona was sent off. 'This is the main stand at Selhurst Park. It's easier to go down the aisles and along the gangways to get to where you want to go. I was on my way to the toilet when I saw him approaching. Not much of an excuse, I know, but sometimes the truth is the simplest of things. Being where I was, probably wasn't the wisest thing. But it is not a criminal offence and certainly does not mean I should be hung, drawn and quartered.'
Having been charged with assault, Cantona told Croydon crown court that, as he walked along the touchline, he had heard Simmons insulting his mother in the crudest way. Simmons is adamant that Cantona lied. 'For God's sake you can't say a worse thing about anyone [than what he alleges I said], can you? What he did in saying that was totally unjustified. The man is filth. How can he accuse me of saying such a thing? Where has this allegation against me come from? From him. It ruined my life. And that is why it is inexcusable.'
Cathy Churchman, who was next to Simmons that night, concedes she never heard what Simmons said. 'There were all these people who said, "Oh we could hear what he shouted out". That's absolute and utter crap because I never heard anybody shout. Everybody was booing because he [Cantona] was sent off. So those who were sitting 11 rows behind us and who claim they could hear what was being said are talking rubbish.'
So what, then, did Simmons actually say? 'Well, unbelievably, not much at all,' he tells me. 'It was so trivial I can't even remember. It was nothing offensive or rude that's for sure. And nothing to justify anything that's happened to me since.'
It has been a delicate process persuading the 30-year-old to meet me. I wrote to him on several occasions and visited the house in Thornton Heath, south London - a few minutes' walk from Selhurst Park - where he has lived all his life with his mother, Jackie. One evening I met Jackie and, standing at the doorway of her house, we discussed her son's visits to Selhurst Park as a youngster, how he had been a ball boy and had helped his mother serve drinks in the club bar. Simmons's father had left home when Matthew was a young child - but that, he says now, was all right 'because I thought at the time, "That gets him out of the way".'
In 1995, Eric Cantona was perhaps the greatest draw in British sport. With his hauteur and chequered disciplinary record, as well as his sublime talent, he dominated the emerging celebrity culture of English football. Simmons, by contrast, had a dark and troubled past, which the tabloids wasted little time in revealing.
They discovered, for instance, that he had attended British National Party and National Front rallies and that, in 1992, he was convicted of attempted violent robbery when he attacked an attendant in a Croydon petrol station. He assaulted Sri Lankan-born Lewis Rajanayagam with a three-foot spanner, striking him in the shoulder rather than the head only because the sales assistant took evasive action. 'I was absolutely terrified,' Rajanayagam said. 'I thought he was going to kill me. Simmons went for my head. If it had hit me there, I would probably have had a broken skull.'
'I am so ashamed of myself,' Simmons says now of the attack. 'People must have raised an eyebrow. Fair enough. But, that did not make me guilty of any wrongdoing in this [the Cantona] incident.'
Simmons was 17 when he attacked Rajanayagam. He was 20 when what he repeatedly calls 'the incident' occurred. At his subsequent trial for threatening language and behaviour, he attacked the prosecution counsel after being found guilty, leaping over a bench and executing a flying kick of his own. He was sentenced to seven days in jail, but only served 24 hours.
He sold his story to the Sun. 'That was a big mistake,' he says. 'What was happening was trial by media, so I thought I needed to have my say. But they [the Sun] asked a question and I would give an honest answer, but it did not turn out like that.'
How much was he paid for the interview? 'It wasn't much.' Tens of thousands? 'No, a few thousand upfront and then the rest was supposed to be paid as a balance. But they never paid. They never do.'
Holed up with the Sun in a Gatwick hotel for 24 hours, Simmons wondered what he was doing and so decided on a rather surprising course of action. 'I called Manchester United. I wanted to find out what was going on. So I phoned [Sir Alex] Ferguson but they [United] might not have known it was me trying to get through. I can't remember what I was thinking at the time. I guess I was looking for a way to defuse the situation.'
Simmons has become something of a reclusive figure. He avoids pubs but still goes to football, preferring to watch Fulham who were, he says, always his first club of choice. He returns occasionally to Palace and has sat in the main stand where the kick occurred. He was at Selhurst Park only a few weeks ago.
He works as a bricklayer and does 'all sorts of things in the construction industry'. The main focus of his life is his seven-year-old son, though he is estranged from the mother of the child. Some members of his family have never spoken to him since 'the incident', which, you feel, will always be with him. 'By kicking me Cantona showed a complete lack of professionalism and self-discipline. Everyone has lost their temper, myself included. The abuse that I got after the event - from Ferguson, from Cantona himself and the media - is inexcusable.'
What would he say if he met Cantona today? 'We could have met already if I had my way and if I wasn't such a nice person. I've got no shame, no embarrassment. He has met friends of mine without knowing. But the emphasis isn't on my actions. What action will he take when he meets me? Where is he going to put his face? Is he going to hang it down? Is he going to turn away, is he going to be aggressive?'
Would an apology make any difference? 'Yes, it would actually, because that would mean he was a real man. He doesn't even have to do it in front of a camera or a reporter. He can just come round to my house and no one would even know. As long as we both know.'
It is possible the Frenchman feels the same way: that although his actions on that evening nearly 10 years ago were wrong, so were those of his victim. Simmons says he is moving house before Christmas to escape renewed interest in him from the media and to protect his son. He seems genuine in his desire to rebuild the rest of his life. Maybe some acceptance of his own responsibility in what happened that night at Selhurst Park would allow him finally to move on.
The reaction
No one could believe it - least of all the bloke who had thrown a sickie to get to the game
All interviews by Jamie Jackson
Sunday October 31, 2004
The Observer
The referee
Alan Wilkie, age 53, then: premiership referee, now: FA regional manager, working in referee development
I did not feel there was going to be a problem until Cantona went down after a challenge. As we left the pitch for half-time, he said: 'No yellow cards!' When we were waiting in the tunnel for the restart, he said it again and [Alex] Ferguson confronted me and said: 'Why don't you just do your fucking job!'
The build-up to Cantona's sending-off went like this: Peter Schmeichel kicked the ball into the Palace half and when Richard Shaw turned to run, Cantona attempted to kick him. I gave him a straight red card.
Cantona is dark-haired and that evening his eyes seemed almost black. With [United's] black strip and the dark night, he looked menacing. Now he had the look of the wounded hero. He gave me the feeling that there was an inevitability about a collision occurring. And now it had, I sensed Cantona wished it had not. Then he looked straight through me, turned and put his collar down. That meant: 'My game is over.' He walked off and stood by Ferguson, who would not acknowledge him. So Cantona moved towards the tunnel.
All of a sudden, players were rushing over there. I manoeuvred myself in between players and crowd, trying to calm it down. Brian McClair was very helpful. He said: 'Alan, blow the whistle and everything will settle.' I restarted the match. The whole episode lasted 92 seconds but it seemed like 92 days.
The family
Cathy Churchman, 49, then: hotel manageress, now: human resources manager
Steven Churchman, 25, then: schoolboy, now: Xerox scheduler
Laura Churchman, 22, then: schoolgirl, now: administrator
In every frame of the incident shown on TV a woman in a pale coat, sat with two children, was laughing - or, alternatively, looking astounded. Cathy Churchman was with her 15-year-old son, Steven, and daughter, Laura, 12, in front-row seats that night.
'That kick changed my life,' Cathy says. 'Because I was so close - his boot skimmed my coat and was inches from my face - I did interviews with newspapers, I was on television. I received call after call inviting me to shows such as Kilroy, which I turned down.
'I started doing sponsorship work with the club after Ron Noades [then Palace chairman] wrote to say he hoped the experience would not deter me from supporting the team. I made numerous friends among the players and [various] managers.
'My husband works in IT and he was in contact with people from all over the world. Some of his colleagues in America were saying, "Your wife is becoming more famous than Princess Di." And we all know how little they go in for football over there.'
'We'd been having a laugh with the guy next to us,' says Steven. 'He'd phoned in sick for work that day. When Cantona was sent off, he was saying, "Oh God, I hope I'm not on Match of the Day or my boss will go mad." My Mum was laughing at this guy, not at what Simmons was saying. We weren't taking that much notice of Cantona. Then Simmons came from 12 or 13 rows back just as Cantona passes. I haven't got a clue what he shouted so I don't know how all these people rows back say they remember.'
All three of the Churchmans sensed Cantona was about to erupt. 'It happened so quickly,' says Laura. 'I was very scared. Cantona behaved with such arrogance.'
Steven Churchman was careful to reflect on the tragic incident later that season when the two clubs met in an FA Cup semi-final at Villa Park. 'A Palace fan was killed [Paul Nixon died from multiple injuries after fighting between fans at a pub] and that shouldn't be forgotten. Retribution was taken for what happened at Selhurst Park. You pay to see football and a guy was killed and you think, "What was the point?" Some people take it all far too seriously.'
The waitress
Klara Ryan, then: waitress at frenchie's, south London restaurant, now: unemployed
The day Cantona won his appeal against a two-week prison sentence, a man came into Frenchie's, a south London restaurant where I worked as a waitress. He was a friend of Cantona's. He said: 'Eric is outside and is wondering if he can eat here, please.' It was three in the afternoon, the restaurant was empty and all the staff were ready to go home. But my boss, who was football crazy, said: 'No problem.' Then he told us, 'Nobody is going home yet because we are going to stay open so Eric Cantona can eat here.'
In came Cantona and three other men. One was English, two French. A meal of pasta was specially prepared and I served the table. Eric was kind and relaxed, a perfect gentleman. He was not pompous at all and did not look worried as if he had just come straight from court. He was clean shaven, smartly dressed in a black suit.He was very handsome. A real man from bone to bone! Eric paid the £58 bill and gave me a large tip. My manager argued with me over the tip but I said: 'Over my dead body! I served him and I deserve to have it.' In the end he said: 'Oh, all right.'
Eric did not want the top copy of the credit card slip so I took it and said to him: 'I'm very, very sorry, but would you mind signing your autograph for me?' I still have the slip today. It will always be one of my greatest treasures.
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je vais manger I am so hungry...je continuerai plus tard