Minor when he was launched in Ligue 1, Elye Wahi is today a major player in the Hérault squad. In the space of sixteen months, the current co-top scorer of La Paillade (8) has indeed brilliantly imposed on the front of the Pailladine attackafter the departure of Andy Delort and Gaëtan Laborde, and while Olivier Dall’Oglio gives him a lot of credit: “Losing them hurt us, but it opened doors for me. Stephy Mavididi and I have taken on more insurance, scope and responsibilities. We try to do the job“, he explained recently, in 100% Paillade, on France Bleu Hérault.
In fact, author of a first goal for his second appearance in the league, under the orders of Michel Der Zakarian, which made him the second youngest goalscorer in club history At only eighteen years and thirteen days behind Abdoulaye Cissé, the native of Courcouronnes has planted eight this season.
“I don’t do everything well, but I do everything to be the best”
Eight is five more than during his first exercise started mid-season, and that’s without counting on the two penalties obtained against Nice and Stade Brestois. A breathtaking total, that of a boy who aims to finish, one day, at the top of the scorers’ rankings, in Ligue 1 : “I do everything to be the best. If I have records to break, I will break them, by continuing to work“, he lets go with the modesty that characterizes him.
To achieve this, Elye Wahi is now giving itself the means. Because if his precocity sometimes exposed him too early to the temptations and risks of the professional world, the young man ended up listening to those who saw in him the qualities of a future great : “I became aware of certain things, the people around me talk to me a lot and help me to become the boy I am today. I continue to work, outside too. On the pitch, I try to give my all, to be the best (…) Eat well, drink well, sleep well. I train a little more, too. Before, I didn’t have the head to go to work. But now, if I have free time, that’s what I do. I took a liking to work, to effort. I don’t do everything well, but I try to improve myself. If I hadn’t realized some things I had to fix, I wouldn’t be where I am today.“.
To view this Twitter content, you must accept cookies Social Networks.
These cookies make it possible to share or react directly on the social networks to which you are connected or to integrate content initially posted on these social networks. They also allow social networks to use your visits to our sites and applications for the purposes of personalization and advertising targeting.
I authorize
High ambitions
This first circle, which he evokes, is made up of a handful of believers. Among them, of course, there is of the mother, Olga : “She is with me everyday, every day. She is the one who helps me, until now. I thank her for everything she does for me, even now. She is a very beautiful person, and I hope she will stay by my side as long as possible.“. A woman who has been living in Montpellier for several months, in the company of her son and the little sister of the prodigy, thanks to the support from Laurent Nicollin and the Hérault clubwithin which it rests on two other pillars.
First, the one he considers his “spiritual father, or his second father“and of which he says he has”done a lot” for him and his family: Francis De Taddeo, boss of the Hérault training, who knew him in Caen, before repatriating him to Montpellier. Next, Frédéric Garnycurrent reserve coach, who led the former Caen native when he coached the MHSC U19s: “It’s the crazy coach! It wasn’t always easy, but he was able to understand me, and he still gives me advice. Sometimes he teased me nicely, let’s put it that way (laughs)“.
The Wahi “clan” is also its representative, a discreet figure in the media, but always at his side. Present in the good times, precious in the bad. And then, how not to quote the one who believed in him very early, when he played at JS Suresnes : Pierre Ville, educator and treasurer of the Variétés Club de France. A man who helped him to join the Norman academy, as he had done before for another kid from the Hauts-de-Seine training: a certain N’Golo Kantéwhich Wahi came across”two or three times“and that he found”very nice, like on TV“.
On the right track
It is therefore thanks to this closed circle that the international U19, as swift as it is powerful and precise, is now moving in the right direction and at high speedwho has sometimes placed more trust in others than in himself: “I’m a very grateful person, I don’t forget where I come from and what I’ve been through. And it’s normal for me, every time there’s a show, to talk about them.”
