Nasri drops curtains on France career

Disenchanted City midfielder ends controversial spell with Les Bleus.

LONDON: Manchester City midfielder Samir Nasri has confirmed his retirement from international football with France.

The 27-year-old dropped a strong hint last week that he had decided to cut short his chequered international career, having been omitted from the France squad that went to the World Cup by coach Didier Deschamps.

“I will only be 29 in 2016 for the European Championship, but the French national team doesn’t make me happy,” said Nasri in an interview with British newspaper The Guardian published on Sunday.

“Every time I go there, there is just more trouble. I face accusations about me and my family suffers from it and I don’t want to make them suffer, so it’s better to stop it and focus on my club career.”

Nasri made his France debut at the age of 19 in 2007 and has won 41 caps, scoring five goals, but his international career has been dogged by controversy.

He clashed with senior players during the 2008 European Championship and unleashed an expletive-strewn tirade at a journalist following France’s elimination at Euro 2012, for which he received a three-game ban.He was also left out of the France squad for the 2010 World Cup.

“Let’s face it, as long as he is going to be the manager, I don’t think I have a shot after everything that has happened,” said Nasri of Deschamps.

“It’s not just him. He did what he thought was best for his team. I understand his choice. It is not something about him.

“It is the press who say things about me and the players as well. Before this World Cup they were saying that some players complain [about me].

“Why do you want me to be in the group with some players who can’t even be true in front of me and tell me that they have a problem? I don’t want to be there. I am not happy.”

Published in The Express Tribune, August 11^th, 2014.

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