Leaving West Ham for Marseille has left Dimitri Payet with a smile on his face, but the whole process has also left him with a few extra pounds, and not the ones that can be converted into Euros, as reported by French newspaper L’Equipe on Friday.
Payet’s build means he has to work hard to stay in the right condition, and L’Equipe reckon that when he’s not in the right condition he’s simply not able to compensate… it detracts from his usefulness more so than with other footballers.
Since arriving from West Ham, it’s been noted Payet has a ‘loss of muscle mass and is slightly overweight’. L’Equipe put this down to the stress of the footballer’s situation at West Ham (taking comfort in cake?) and Slaven Bilic making Payet train with the club’s U23 squad, sometimes even the U18s.
Such is Payet’s condition, L’Equipe say it’s going to take three weeks for him to get in shape. The finger isn’t pointed solely at West Ham, that would be ridiculous, it’s explained Payet had a ‘loss of motivation’ because he was training with the youngsters.
The saga was launched by none other than L’Equipe on January 2nd, and on January 29th West Ham agreed a feee and Payet was a Marseille player.
That’s just 27 days, but L’Equipe say that whatever happened in that period has left Payet currently only having an hour’s worth of football in his legs.
Marseille believe it’ll take three weeks to get the player right.
