Patrice Evra has signed for West Ham United on a contract until the end of the season.
Evra joins the Premier League as a free agent after getting sacked by Marseille back in November following an altercation with a supporter of the club. The former France captain, who turns 37 in May, was also banned by Uefa for aiming a kick at the fan before a Europa League tie, but he’s free to help West Ham in their battle to remain in the Premier League this season
It will be interesting to see how Evra fares back in England at this stage of his career. During his nine seasons with Manchester United, he was one of the best left-backs in the Premier League and European football. Evra made 379 appearances for the club, and won five Premier League titles, the Champions League, three League Cups and the Fifa Club World Cup. However, his final season at the club, before departing for Juventus in 2014, wasn’t a successful or happy one – it was the year of David Moyes.
United went into the campaign as defending Premier League champions, but ended it in seventh place. Moyes’ tenure was cut short just nine months into a six-year contract. It was a disastrous season, and many of the senior players had disputes with their manager. An old Manchester Evening News article claims that Moyes and Evra had an argument over a bacon sandwich.
According to the report by Mike Keegan, Evra had a “miserable time” under Moyes, and their dispute over the sandwich happened at Manchester airport before a Champions League tie.
“Staff at the airport are said to have laid on the butties as a goodwill gesture but the Scot was reportedly furious with Evra when he took one. On the flight the mischievous defender is rumoured to have made a passenger announcement, explaining that there had been a change to the in-flight menu and that it would be bacon sandwiches all round.”
Moyes was said to be unhappy with Evra for this, and the French defender was reportedly determined to leave the club until Moyes was sacked, at which point he then had second thoughts about his decision. Evra ended-up joining Juventus, Nemanja Vidic signed for Inter Milan and Rio Ferdinand went to Queens Park Rangers. All three were said to have issues with Moyes’ management.
The West Ham manager is said to have made Ferdinand and Vidic study videos of Phil Jagielka defending, while Ferdinand wrote in his autobiography that Moyes annoyed the players by removing oven chips from the menu at the club.
“It’s not something to go to the barricades over (the chips). But all the lads were p***** off,” Rio said.
“And guess what happened after Moyes left and Ryan Giggs took over? “Moyes has been gone about 20 minutes, we’re on the bikes warming up for the first training session and one of the lads says: ‘You know what? We’ve got to get on to Giggsy. We’ve got to get him to get us our f****** chips back.'”
Moyes strict regime, particularly when it came to food, seemingly led to clashes with some of United’s senior players. As long as Moyes refrains from mentioning Jagielka, and Evra stays away from the bacon sandwiches, the two should get along fine at West Ham for the rest of the season.
