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Thierry Henry has struggled to shake off a player's mindset - Julien Laurens

Thierry Henry's on and off-pitch troubles can be traced to him struggling to change into a manage...



Thierry Henry has struggled to...
Soccer

Thierry Henry has struggled to shake off a player's mindset - Julien Laurens

Thierry Henry's on and off-pitch troubles can be traced to him struggling to change into a manager's mindset, according to French football journalist Julien Laurens.

Julien joined us to discuss Henry's current predicament at Monaco, where even the signing of Cesc Fabregas has not managed to stall a terrible run of form.

Monaco are three points off safety, following a 5-1 home defeat to Strasbourg - a game in which Henry verbally abused an opposing player: Kenny Lala.

"He got slaughtered [for abusing Lala] - and rightly so.

"It was one of those where he didn't say it directly to Lala.

"He said afterwards that it is a street sentence, which is one that you say towards someone but not directly at someone.

"I think he realised very quickly that he was wrong. He tried to justify himself by saying 'Sometimes I say worse than that, but it is in English so no-one understands,' but that doesn't make it right.

"He is trying to say that everyone is human, but not many managers do that either."

Julien believes that such symptoms are indicative of a more worrying root:

"The heart of the problem for me is that he thinks he is above other people.

"He still behaves like he is either a player or a pundit, but not really like a manager.

"For me, what he said to Kenny Lala is what you can say from one player to another in the heat of a game [...] but not when you are a manager, that doesn't work anymore.

"He has to change his attitude, the way he behaves, his body language is wrong.

"Sometimes he looks like he's one of the boys. Until he changes to manager mode, I think he's unclear as to where he's going!"

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Football France Monaco Soccer Thierry Henry