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‘I’m Not Flirting with Any Team’: Marseille Coach De Zerbi Denies Exit Talks amid Tensions

Marseille's Italian head coach Roberto De Zerbi reacts during the French L1 football match between Stade de Reims and Olympique de Marseille (OM) at Stade Auguste-Delaune in Reims, northern France on March 29, 2025. (AFP)
Marseille's Italian head coach Roberto De Zerbi reacts during the French L1 football match between Stade de Reims and Olympique de Marseille (OM) at Stade Auguste-Delaune in Reims, northern France on March 29, 2025. (AFP)
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‘I’m Not Flirting with Any Team’: Marseille Coach De Zerbi Denies Exit Talks amid Tensions

Marseille's Italian head coach Roberto De Zerbi reacts during the French L1 football match between Stade de Reims and Olympique de Marseille (OM) at Stade Auguste-Delaune in Reims, northern France on March 29, 2025. (AFP)
Marseille's Italian head coach Roberto De Zerbi reacts during the French L1 football match between Stade de Reims and Olympique de Marseille (OM) at Stade Auguste-Delaune in Reims, northern France on March 29, 2025. (AFP)

Marseille coach Roberto De Zerbi says he wants to stay on at the French league club and insisted Friday that he has not been contacted by other clubs despite reports of a player mutiny and interest from AC Milan.

Speaking during a conference Friday, De Zerbi said he is "not flirting with any team."

"At the moment I have no desire to leave," De Zerbi said. "My intention is to stay here for many years. Since it takes two to make a marriage, we still need to see a lot of things, and how we finish in the league".

Marseille has developed an attractive and effective style of play under De Zerbi but has been going through a bad patch of results, losing four of its past five matches. The team, however, remains in third place in the French league standings, in a position to qualify for next season's Champions League ahead of Sunday's match against Toulouse.

According to L'Equipe, De Zerbi has been facing criticism from his players, who are questioning his authoritative methods. The sports daily reported that De Zerbi was so angry with his team after a loss at Reims that he refused to run a training session this week, leaving it to his staff, and that the club's director of football had to intervene to diffuse the dispute as many players felt humiliated.

"I know when it’s time to hug my players and when it’s time to be a little stronger," De Zerbi said. "I’m not afraid, I’m ready to do anything for my job. That’s what I want to pass on to the team. I don’t want everyone’s approval, but everything has to be done at 100%."

Meanwhile, La Gazzetta dello Sport reported that De Zerbi is now the favorite to take over at Milan, with Massimiliano Allegri and Antonio Conte also considered for the job.

Since American owner Frank McCourt bought Marseille in 2016, the former powerhouse of French soccer has failed to find any form of stability, with a succession of coaches and crises that sometimes turned violent.

The club has changed coach 30 times since the beginning of the century, the highest total of any top-flight team in France in that period. The 1993 Champions League winner missed out on European qualification after finishing eighth in the French league last season.

Marseille dominated domestic soccer in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It is the only French team to win the Champions League but hasn’t won the domestic league since 2010.

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Sinner Details the Loss and Confusion He Felt after Accepting Doping Ban

Tennis - Italian Open - Jannik Sinner Press Conference - Foro Italico, Rome, Italy - May 5, 2025 Italy's Jannik Sinner gestures during a TV interview after the press conference. (Reuters)
Tennis - Italian Open - Jannik Sinner Press Conference - Foro Italico, Rome, Italy - May 5, 2025 Italy's Jannik Sinner gestures during a TV interview after the press conference. (Reuters)
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Sinner Details the Loss and Confusion He Felt after Accepting Doping Ban

Tennis - Italian Open - Jannik Sinner Press Conference - Foro Italico, Rome, Italy - May 5, 2025 Italy's Jannik Sinner gestures during a TV interview after the press conference. (Reuters)
Tennis - Italian Open - Jannik Sinner Press Conference - Foro Italico, Rome, Italy - May 5, 2025 Italy's Jannik Sinner gestures during a TV interview after the press conference. (Reuters)

Jannik Sinner has said he was lost and confused after receiving a three-month doping ban in a settlement with the World Anti-Doping Agency in February.

The top-ranked tennis player suddenly didn’t know what do with himself away from the game he had dedicated almost his entire life to.

“At the start I was a bit confused because I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do,” Sinner said Monday — the day the ban expired — upon his arrival at the Italian Open. “Then I went home and stayed with my family. I tried to understand better what was really important to me.

“I know how many sacrifices I made and my daily routine was always practice, practice, practice,” Sinner added. “But at that moment I didn’t have any of that. I came to understand that what’s important to me are the people by your side. That they give you the strength to move forward and continue smiling.”

Besides his family in the German-speaking Alto Adige region of northern Italy, Sinner also spent more time with friends at home in Monaco, participated in other sports like cycling, and then only gradually came back to tennis.

“We went about a month without touching (a racket) and then we restarted really softly,” Sinner said. “When we started pushing more, blisters developed on my hands. That was something I hadn’t experienced in a long time.”

The settlement was made after WADA appealed a decision last year by the International Tennis Integrity Agency to fully exonerate Sinner for what it deemed to be an accidental contamination by a banned anabolic steroid in March 2024.

The settlement raised questions, since it conveniently allows Sinner to return at his home tournament and not miss any Grand Slams.

The Italian Open is the last big clay-court tournament before the French Open — the year’s second Grand Slam — starts on May 25.

“I didn’t want to do it in the beginning, and also it was a bit not easy for me to accept it, because I know what really happened,” Sinner said of the ban. “But sometimes we have to choose the best in a very bad moment, and that’s what we did. So it’s all over now. So I’m happy to play tennis again.”

Many fellow pros feel that Sinner was treated too lightly.

Serena Williams said in a recent interview with Time magazine that she “would have gotten 20 years” if she was involved in a similar case. “Let’s be honest. I would have gotten Grand Slams taken away from me,” Williams added.

“I just arrived 45 minutes ago. I haven’t seen so many (other players),” Sinner said. “It’s all fine at the moment, but I haven't seen most of them.”

It will mark the first time that Italy has had a No. 1 player for its home tournament and every move that Sinner makes is attracting attention this week.

Sinner was scheduled to hold an open practice session later on Campo Centrale that is expected to attract a sold-out crowd of 10,500 spectators. It will be broadcast live on Italian TV.

Before the practice session, Sinner was to be honored alongside his Davis Cup teammates and the Billie Jean King Cup players after Italy swept both of tennis’ biggest team titles last year.

Sinner hasn’t played a match since he won his second straight Australian Open title in January. After a first-round bye, he will be play his opening match Friday or Saturday against either No. 99 Mariano Navone or 18-year-old Italian wild card Federico Cinà.

The last Italian man to win the title in Rome was Adriano Panatta in 1976.

“It’s a very, very low expectation tournament in general for me,” Sinner said. “It’s a very strange feeling again in the beginning to be around so many people and attention. But it’s nice to be back.”