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Real Madrid, accustomed to Zinedine Zidane’s escapist abilities to avoid excessive charring, will now see the direct management of the elimination hangover against Alcoyano rest on their second-in-command, David Bettoni (Saint-Priest, France, 49 years old). The club reported this Friday that the coach had tested positive for coronavirus, which, according to LaLiga protocol, leads him to a minimum of ten days of isolation since the sample was taken, on Thursday. This Friday he was not in training, this Saturday he will not travel to Vitoria for the match against Alavés (9:00 p.m., Movistar LaLiga) and will have to follow the team’s march from a distance at least until after the match against Levante at the Alfredo di Stéfano, on Saturday, January 30.
“He’s in good spirits, he was this morning [por este viernes] a little sad for not being with us. He will not be physically present, but he will be supporting us, “said Bettoni in an appearance before the media, his public debut after years of being a step behind Zidane in the band. “I do my job as assistant coach, I’m here to support the coach. I give him some information, but he makes every decision, I am here to help him ”, he summarized.
They will maintain that procedure, in which Bettoni is always the last one to whisper in Zidane’s ear before he executes a movement. These days he will have to communicate it, but this Friday he insisted that they will remain together: “He will be with us; not physically, but with his energy, ”he said.
The operation of the communication between the two, and of Zidane with the squad, was not yet defined this Friday, but Bettoni wanted to make it clear that they would retain the influence of the coach in one of the most delicate moments of the season. “We are working on the details. The important thing is that we all know that Zidane is going to be with us, ”he said.
Few people know the French coach better than David Bettoni. “For three years at the Cannes training center, we were always together. From breakfast to dinner, from training sessions to games, to rest days. We even half-subscribed to Canal Plus. Yaz and I were inseparable ”, he says in the book Zidaneby Frédéric Hermel.
The two met more than thirty years ago in the Cannes quarry and became friends at the residence where they lived, where Zidane also met his wife, Véronique. The friendship with Bettoni was born from an element of the bathroom of his neighbor and today boss: “Yaz had a bidet in his room and he suggested that I go take care of myself in his few square meters. And there we share the story of our lives, ”he says in Hermel’s book.
Since then, they have stayed close. Bettoni moved to Italy when Zidane signed for Juventus in 1996, although he to travel a path in second-row teams: Avezzano, Alessandria, Novara, Lucchese and Brescello. They met again in 2017 at Real Madrid, when Zidane was appointed coach of Castilla and integrated his friend into the technical team as an assistant, despite not having the license required by the Spanish federation.
They walked together the path of the Second B fields to the three consecutive Champions League, together they left Chamartín in 2018, and together they returned in 2019. Passionate about tactics, Bettoni embodies the most slate side of the couple, and frees Zidane from an aspect that does not seduce you in a special way. Although he celebrates their contributions. In December, after scoring 1-0 against Atlético from a corner at the Di Stéfano, Casemiro recognized the assistant: “David Bettoni, who is the one who is aware of fouls, had said that you had to be attentive to the first post and Toni put it very well, “he said. Zidane liked the mention: “I’m glad you said it. We don’t work on it much in the field, but we watch it with video ”.
Now he has at least ten days alone in front, with Zizou in the distance. Then, according to LaLiga protocol, the coach will pass another PCR and a serological test. If you test negative on the first or Ig positive on the second (which has developed long-lasting antibodies), you can return to work with the group. If not, he will spend another three days apart and will have to repeat PCR and serology.
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