Marcel Desailly was at one point regarded as one of the best defenders in the World but there was one player he hated coming up against in the Premier League – Newcastle’s Alan Shearer.
France international and Chelsea legend, Marcel Desailly has been considered amongst the greatest defenders of all time, but even he had nightmares about facing up against Alan Shearer, and rightly so.
As one of England‘s greatest strikers and one of France’s greatest defenders, the pair faced off many times at club and International level. The unstoppable force and the immovable object.
Marcel Desailly ‘hated’ playing against Alan Shearer
Marcel Desailly appeared on SuperSport recently and in a clip posted on their official TikTok, Desailly was asked who was the toughest player he came up against to which he said: “I hated playing against Alan Shearer. English best goal scorer? Is he still the one? Okay, he’s lucky that Harry Kane left.“
It’s no surprise that Desailly hated playing against Shearer as the club’s most famous Number 9 scored one of his finest Newcastle goals against Desailly’s Chelsea in 2004.
The ball came to Shearer outside of the area and with Desailly at his back, Shearer pushed the giant Frenchman off him, turned and unleashed a rocket of a shot into the corner from about 25 yards. It was a think of absolute beauty and definitely in his top 5 best goals.
Desailly has been very complimentary of Newcastle
That was the second compliment Desailly fired in Newcastle’s direction in the same interview as he previously said that St James’ Park was his favourite Premier League ground to play in – although maybe not on that particular day.
As someone who was a massive fan of Desailly I love seeing him bigging up Newcastle. If only we could have signed him before Chelsea got there.
Shearer up front and Desailly at the back? Tell me that wouldn’t have been immense.
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