Lilian Thuram, one of world sport's most outspoken and inspirational anti-racism campaigners, and the most capped player in the history of the France national team, has retired at the age of 36.
Rob Hughes of the International Herald Tribune has written a fitting tribute to Thuram, an excerpt from which can be read below.
Lilian Thuram, who rivaled Michel Platini and Zinédine Zidane as the most influential players in French soccer and surpassed them both in the number of times he represented the country, has called time on his career.
He is no more likely to go quietly into retirement than he was to let a cause escape him on the pitch. A descendent from slavery, a World Cup winner, a member of the French Legion of Honor, Thuram finished playing after a heart scare a month ago.
The diagnosis came as he underwent a routine medical screening while intending to join Paris St. Germain. The test proved a false alarm. "Like all sportsmen," Thuram said at a news conference in Paris on Friday, "I have a rather muscular heart. I'm very glad I am not sick, I will still be able to play with my children and friends with a football.
"But considering my age, 36, and the wishes of my mum, I understand that this is the time to stop. It would not be fair for me to make those who are important to me undergo such fear."
Alarm
The initial alarm was that Thuram had ventricular hypertrophy, the disease that caused the sudden deaths of a spate of soccer players and runners in their prime last year. The fact that he is healthy, and in no need to pursue further riches through professional play, leaves him free to follow the role for which he is uniquely qualified: to use the platform of his game to confront racial tensions in society.
"Football," he once said in an interview with The Observer in London, "can teach you about life, but it is no substitute for life, if you see what I mean, for the real world, for real problems, real conflicts."
Born Ruddy Lilian Thuram-Ulien in the village of Anse-Bertrand on the French-Caribbean island of Guadeloupe, he became a child of Paris suburban soccer after arriving there to join his mother, a single parent, when he was 9. He rose in the French national team disparaged as more black than white by the far-right politician Jean-Marie Le Pen.
Never afraid to speak his mind when racism rears its ugly head, Thuram responded to Le Pen by saying: "'Je ne suis pas noir, je suis français," meaning, "I'm not black, I'm French."
Racism
Seven years ago, after the International Herald Tribune had led its front page with a study of racism throughout soccer, Thuram and this writer teamed up to lead some of the top players - black and white - in Italian football on a cover story for Sport Week, the color magazine of La Gazzetta dello Sport.
Thuram was playing at the time for Juventus. Two colleagues, Alessandro Del Piero and Fabio Cannavaro, and two other stars, Stefano Fiore and Filippo Inzaghi, appeared with their faces painted black to identify with the theme that skills had nothing to do with the color of a man's skin.
Thuram will not stop talking now that he has stopped playing. He is arguably the most well-read soccer player of his time, both in terms of the history of slavery and of immigration and integration.
Passion
He became a member of France's Council on Social Integration while still a top defender for Monaco, Parma, Juventus and Barcelona. He was the symbol of the European Union's 50th anniversary celebration, which used soccer's example of sport leading society against prejudice.
The European Commission's president, José Manuel Barroso, said then: "There is no better way to showcase the European Union at 50 than through Europe's favorite sport that unites Europeans in a unique way, through a passion we all share and a language we all speak."
Thuram's soccer days are done, but his heart and his voice remain strong. We are lucky to have him.
From The International Herald Tribune For the full article, visit iht.com
