Electronic Arts, the American publisher of the football simulation video game “EA Sports FC”, the new name of “Fifa”, announced on Thursday a partnership with Zinédine Zidane’s five-a-side football complex, the “Z5” in Aix-en-Provence. in Provence, to “support local football”. For the occasion, the former Real Madrid coach expressed his desire to train Kylian Mbappé one day.
This partnership is part of its investment plan of 10 million dollars at the global level, intended to “provide privileged access” to land for young children, in terms of supervision or transport, as well as programs of training sessions designed in collaboration with UEFA, the European football confederation.
“It’s good to be able to create this pitch which will allow all the kids to come and play in a magnificent place. When I was young, I didn’t have the possibility of coming to a place like that. We played in the neighborhood, it was concrete, there were no goals”, confided Zinedine Zidane, on the sidelines of the inauguration of the new ground dedicated to Aix-en-Provence, where his former teammate David Beckham was also present.
Expected release next fall for the new Fifa
Child of Castellane, in the northern districts of Marseille, Zinédine Zidane launched in August 2020 his educational project for young people, called “Zidane Five Club”, aimed at developing the practice of sport, especially in priority districts.
Leader of the genre since 1993 and the release of the first opus “Fifa International Soccer”, developed each year by Electronic Arts (EA), the famous football simulation video game will be renamed “EA Sports FC” for the 2024 edition, whose release is scheduled for next fall, due to the end of the partnership with the International Federation of Association Football (Fifa).
325 million copies in less than 30 years
Several media had reported that Fifa had requested that the envelope allocated by EA for the use of its name be raised from 150 to 250 million dollars.
Despite this change, EA has kept its agreements with all the other leagues and federations which allow it to offer to choose from more than 19,000 existing players. In almost 30 years, the game has sold more than 325 million copies, according to figures published by EA in early 2021, making it the best-selling sports simulation in history.
Zidane wants to train Mbappé
At the end of an interview regarding his new partnership, Zidane admitted that he would love to coach Kylian Mbappé one day. “When you are a coach and you have a player like that, you want to train him. A lot of things can happen. It could happen one day. In any case, I admire what he done, like many people today. It’s strong what he does, it’s beautiful! He’s a French player, he wears the jersey of the France team, so we’re proud ” he explained.
