Sidelined by Corinne Deacon, Amandine Henry is preparing to return to Les Bleues during a friendly preparation in Ireland on Thursday. An ideal timing two weeks before the World Cup, which shows the experience of the medium in the art of proving wrong all those who doubt it.
951 days. More than two and a half years lived like an eternity. This is the time that has elapsed since Amandine Henry’s last international cap. Sidelined by Corinne Deacon in November 2020, the midfielder no longer thought of wearing the blue jersey again. However, it could be on the pre against Ireland, Thursday, July 6, at Tallaght Stadium in Dublin, to play the first preparation meeting of the France team before the World Cup (July 20-August 20).
A return that she owes in large part to the new coach, Hervé Renard, who arrived at the end of March to calm an explosive situation at Les Bleues. “I take it as a second chance, had recognized the new recruit from Angel City in the United States, at the microphone of “All sport”, on June 22. When talking about “not a very fun time” to qualify her months of absence in selection, Amandine Henry had indicated that “that [allait] to be a force for the future”. A kind of adage for this player who has been nourished by the difficulties crossed to prove, to her detractors and even to medicine, that she knew how to overcome all obstacles.
Playing with boys, a constraint then an asset
Because nothing was spared this Northerner, forced to deal with the difference from her early years. As a chick at the OSM Lomme, the young girl evolves with the boys, for lack of a women’s team, and is then accepted by her talent. “She was not like my other striker, she passed the ball when she saw a better placed team-mate. She had a sense of the collective and the boys liked her”said David Vanlerberghe, his very first trainer, at The voice of the North.
Despite an already visible potential, the one who is helped by her father to work on her technique is failed by LOSC at 10 years old. Never mind, the budding champion joined the men of Iris Lambersart, soon known throughout the region as “girl’s team”as the teenager displays her dominance on the field, with the added bonus of the captain’s armband.
“It’s not so bad, because if I hadn’t started with [les garçons de l’Iris], I wouldn’t be here today. They taught me to have character, to do everything more quickly”, welcomed Amandine Henry in The magazine team. Qualities also perceived by Patrice Lair. “JI have often repeated to her that she could play for men because she is a player who approaches the characteristics of more physical men’s footballdetails his coach in Lyon and PSG. That explains why she never has a bad game: if she’s not having a good day, she’ll at least bring her athletic superiority.”
A knee in the “battlefield”
With this basic baggage in hand, Amandine Henry made her debut in the first division brilliantly on the side of Hénin-Beaumont. With eleven achievements in twenty games, the barely 15-year-old midfielder distinguished herself to the point of joining the national women’s club of Clairerontaine in 2005, then opening the doors of Olympique Lyonnais, which asserted itself as a behemoth among girls, two years later. “Professional footballer, that didn’t exist, it was federal contracts and you had to work on the side. One day, the professional contract was born for women, and that’s it, I fell into the right period”, explained the interested party to Marie Claire.
But this chance, Amandine Henry was almost deprived of it. Blame it on a recalcitrant right knee. Very soon after his arrival between Rhône and Saône, the doctor of the women’s section, Jean-Jacques Amprino, realizes that something is wrong. “People from the technical staff told me that she was one of the best of her generation, but she felt too much pain”remembers the 75-year-old doctor.
“We did classic exams and we spotted a chondropathy. The cartilage between the patella and the femur was very damaged. As soon as she made an effort, her knee swelled, made effusions or was blocked.”
Jean-Jacques Amprino, former OL doctorat franceinfo: sport
“When we reached the end of what we could do in traditional care, we tried the last-ditch solution with a cartilage graft”details the one who “punctured her many times”. “Amandine was no longer able to do her job. Her knee looked more like a battlefield than anything elseconfirms Bernard Moyen, the surgeon who operated on her. It was far from a foregone conclusion, but we reproduced a decent cartilaginous surface and it held on with courage.”
“I had to reprogram my brain, readapt my body: instead of taking support on my right foot, it was on my left foot. Even today, specialists don’t understand when they see my X-rays that I don’t feel pain. , that science is not exact”smiled the player in 2019. After long months of rehabilitation and re-athletics, La Fenotte is making her return to competition when the doctors predicted the end of her career. “She had a steely mind and never gave in even though she had a hard time. Without that, she wouldn’t have made it afterwards,” assures Jean-Jacques Amprino.
Already sidelined by the Blues
The result is a new setback in his career, however finally launched. Holder in Lyon, Amandine Henry also discovered the French team in April 2009. Upon his arrival on the bench of OL in June 2010, Patrice Lair discovered a champion in the making. “Despite her young age, she was above the rest. She was a leader in the middle, someone who never gave up. Even on one leg, she already had an ability to break lines and hit hard.”depicts the current Bordeaux coach.
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But once again, his ascent is slowed down. Centerpiece of an OL winner of its first European Cup, Amandine Henry saw the French coach, Bruno Bini, do without her at the start of 2011. “There had been a confrontation of Lyonnaises with Corinne Petitreveals Patrice Lair for whom the non-selection of his number 6 remains “an error which deprived the Blue of a title” at the 2011 World Cup or at the London Olympics in 2012. In a locker room, some people don’t get along. Me, I made no difference at club and there was no problem, so I don’t see why it would have gone badly in selection“.
During the international windows, the blonde with the ponytail therefore took refuge in work and it paid off with a first C1-D1-Coupe hat-trick during the following season. “I missed the French team. I always gave everything, and then it allowed me to come back stronger. It forged my character, to show them that they were wrong”has since expanded.
“This first sanction hardened her. This experience allowed her to mature, to give herself an additional shell to face other difficulties later in her career.”
Patrice Lair, former OL women’s coachat franceinfo: sport
The fact remains that once reinstated, before Euro 2013, Amandine Henry takes part in all international competitions, while her club trophy cabinet is filling up at full speed. So much so that she decides to pack up in the summer of 2016 for Portland. The opportunity to further develop its palette across the Atlantic. “When I got her back during the American break for two months at PSG, she had adopted the local mentality. She took her head less”recalls Patrice Lair, stationed in the capital in the winter of 2017. A good omen.
Deacon’s test
After a 2019 World Cup disputed in France, as captain of Corinne Deacon, the native of Lille – since returned to the bosom of Jean-Michel Aulas – is going through a new complicated period. From the top of her 14 French championships and seven European cups with Lyon, from her regular podiums among the best players of the year or from her 93 selections for the French team, Amandine Henry is dismissed by the coach for having assumed her responsibilities. by alerting on behalf of a group on managerial management in the fall of 2020.
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Even when she scored a fabulous goal in the Champions League final against Barcelona in 2022, the Frenchwoman was not selected to compete in the Euro. “I had resigned myself. I said to myself: that’s how it is, that’s life. I suffered. I asked myself questions. I had to find another dream”she recently admitted to theAFPconceding that she had used the support of a mental trainer.
“I learned that you could be at the top of the bill and then at the bottom overnight, that nothing is certain, that you have to question yourself. But also that you should never lower arms because anything can happen”, she added, once recalled by Hervé Renard. To give a final snub to the crowd, all she has to do now is lead France to their first world title in Australia.