The death of goalkeeper Bruno Martini

It’s a passion that fits the character and his image well. A goalkeeper more cerebral than intuitive, Bruno Martini was also a skilled chess player. In 1986, the porter of AJ Auxerre appears his mother “To the queen” in one of his rare television interviews, so much the man had the word rare but always thoughtful and well articulated. Born on January 25, 1962 in Nevers, he thanked the one who had encouraged him to continue his studies rather than join a football training center at the age of 16. “In this way, I was able to continue a completely normal education. This is what allows me to approach matches with serenity and calm and to analyze situations more easily. “

Calm, serenity and analysis, three words that perfectly sum up the career of the former international goalkeeper (31 selections between 1987 and 1996 with the France team), who died on October 20, at the age of 58, at the Arnaud-de-Villeneuve hospital in Montpellier. Bruno Martini had been hospitalized since October 12 following a cardio-respiratory arrest which occurred while leaving the training center of the Montpellier club – he was the deputy director of the training center.

Michel Platini was one of the first to pay tribute to him, that of a former coach who had made Martini his irremovable goalkeeper from November 1989 to July 1992. “He was the perfect player, for a coach, because he was a very good goalkeeper, but also a respected, respectable person, a great and kind guy”, testified the former number 10 of the Blues, questioned by the team.

Bruno Martini was in the France team the keeper of the in-between, this period of transition between the last fires of the Platini generation and the titles of the Zidane era. In national selection, as in club, he took his trouble patiently, without ever claiming anything, before taking over, in Auxerre, from Joël Bats, another silent, but more focused on poetry when Martini loved great music and confessed his inclination to “Mozart, Wagner, Bach but, above all, Handel”.

European champion hopes with Cantona

With the Blues, Martini achieved a perfect score in qualifying for Euro 1992 (eight wins in eight games) before the false note in the final phase and elimination in the first round. Platini then made his manager’s raincoat, Gérard Houllier, his successor, maintained his confidence in Auxerrois before Bernard Lama took advantage of the Bourguignon’s injury to settle in the cages.

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