In the footsteps of an older brother has his advantages. Just ask Benoit Badiashile.
Blues' defender was born in 2001, three years after his only brother or sister Loic. Football crazy and has a lot of natural talent, Loic would pass on his love for the game to his little brother. Benoit had no choice but to immerse itself in sport. It was in the streets of Limoges, in the southwest of France, that he started his football trip.
“I played with my brother in the center of the city,” Benoit tells us.
“We have always played. He is older than me, and that helped. It gave me strength and competitive mind. I had to learn to fight! It was good.
'I didn't play at school, but one day I went to watch my brother training at Limoges, our local club. I was to do keepy-ups with the ball. The Gaffer of my brother's team saw me and asked me to come and train with us. That's how I started playing well. '
A few years ahead, and Benoit followed the goalkeeper Loic again, this time by signing for as Monaco. They even lived together as soon as Benoit had become professional.
“He gave me a lot of advice,” laughs Benoit. “He made a few mistakes and he spoke with me and said,” Don't do this or do this. ” It was easy for me. It was a big help.
“We are still so close, so.” Benoit wraps his index fingers around each other. “I speak to him every day.”
It is not only up to his brother that Benoit owes a lot of gratitude. His parents made him the man he is today: friendly, calm and funny. They were born in the Republic of Congo and met there before they moved to France. They have ingrained Congolese values ​​in their sons: “To share and love each other,” says Benoit. He laughs. “And the food too!”
Benoit started playing for the Limoges youth teams at the age of seven, but it was not long before his family was moving to Malesherbes, a smaller city about 40 miles south of Paris. His mother got a job there in a factory and also took care of his father, who was not good enough to work.
Between the ages of eight and 12, Benoit played for sports club Malesherbois: “The freedom they gave me was the most important thing I learned,” he says.
By thanking the club for their role in his development, Benoit and his brother founded a high -profile youth tournament last year. It is called the BLB Cup, named after the brothers and sisters, and the inaugural edition was won by Monaco Under-13s and Chelsea Under-11s.
It was during the play for Malesherbes that Loic was noticed by Monaco. He signed up. Not for the first time Benoit followed the example.
'The same explorer who explored him went to one of my games and said he wanted me to sign for Monaco. The choice was easy to say yes. It was a great feeling. '
Benoit initially moved to an academy in Chateauroux. Just like the prestigious Clairefontaine, it is managed by the French football federation [FFF].
“I was 12 years old when I went to Chateauroux, and in the beginning I cried every day,” he admits.
“Leaving my family was the most difficult. I wanted to stop to come back to Malesherbes. My mother, and my father, also said that I had to be strong and have to keep working.
“It got better. Football became a little more serious. You start to understand the game more. I trained every day in Chateauroux and I did school there too.
'If you spend every day with the same people every day, you start to create some friendships. It was good. '
After accelerating his development under the watchful eye of the FFF, Benoit moved to the south to Monaco in 2016. “They were the best years of my life when I lived there in the academy, with all my friends, started to see many new things,” he laughs. “They were really good times.”
Benoit signed his first professional contract at the age of 16.
“I was a bit surprised. Wow. It was something big for me. I was really young and I once trained with the professional team. It was a great feeling. A really great feeling. '
The following year, at the end of 2018, Benoit settled in the Senior team of Monaco. He quickly made his Champions League debut and played the full 90 minutes in the middle of the back to Atletico Madrid. He was only 17.
Benoit did not look back and has so far built up nearly 200 career performances, including two for the French national team. There is a clarity of thinking in Benoit's statement why he thinks he could make it in the professional game, while many of his teammates in Chateauroux and in the Monaco Academy were not.
“I knew what I wanted,” he says.
“I wanted to become a professional football player. I knew what to do to become a professional football player. I had to work. Keep working. Even when it was difficult when I was younger. You just have to clean your mind and be the best what you can do. '
And of course he always had his big brother Loic by his side by his side.
“He is the person who has influenced my life and my career the most. He helped me a lot and he keeps doing that.
'Given all the challenges I had to face during my career, both positive and negative, he has always been there. Without him I don't think I would have come that far. '
The Badiaashile Brothers: United in Life and in Football.