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UCL Paul Pogba watches on before making his return to football with Monaco in last week's Ligue 1 match against Rennes Lou Benoist/Getty Images Scarcely in football history can a player coming on in the 85th minute for a team losing 4-0 away from home have received such a rapturous reception. Clad in Monaco’s daffodil-yellow third kit, Paul Pogba stood in the rain on the touchline at Rennes’ Roazhon Park last Saturday and clapped his hands together as team-mate Mamadou Coulibaly made his way towards him. When he crossed the touchline and trotted onto the pitch — black gloves, white boots, sock-tops pulled up above his knees — the entire crowd roared its approval. Advertisement It had been 811 days since his previous competitive appearance, which came for Juventus in a Serie A fixture against Empoli on September 3, 2023. Over the intervening period, the France international midfielder had gone through more trials and tribulations than many footballers endure in their whole careers: a litany of injuries — knee, hamstring, groin — that restricted him to just 161 minutes of action in 2022-23, the first of his second spell with Juventus; a four-year doping ban, subsequently reduced to 18 months on appeal, that left him wondering if he would ever play again; and an unimaginably traumatic €13million (£11. 4m/$15. 1m at current rates) blackmail plot, cruelly played out in public, that culminated in one of his own brothers, Mathias, and five other men being convicted of attempted extortion. But now, at long, long last, Pogba was back. There were further cheers when, with his first meaningful touch, he picked up possession on the edge of the centre circle and flighted a trademark diagonal pass towards a team-mate on the right flank. He had only 17 touches in his late cameo, but there were nevertheless signs from Monaco’s new No 8 that he remains the Pogba of old: a sharp Cruyff turn to evade trouble in his own half, an attempted sombrero flick over Rennes midfielder Mahdi Camara and even, at one point, a no-look pass. Each drew an approving purr or cheer from even the home support. It is, of course, much easier to show magnanimity towards an opposing player when your team are cruising towards a thumping win, as Rennes were, but to French eyes, Pogba is no ordinary opposing player. A World Cup winner and household name, he became the first player to make his Ligue 1 debut having already made over 50 senior appearances for France. At the final whistle, the 32-year-old knelt and pressed his forehead to the sodden turf in prayer. When he disappeared down the tunnel moments later, after sharing embraces with several Rennes players, it was with tears in his eyes and his hand on his heart. Advertisement “The fans’ reception really moved me, ” Pogba told reporters afterwards. “Seeing the fans standing and applauding like that, I’d never have imagined it. Thanks to all the fans who supported me. ” With Monaco eighth in 18-team Ligue 1, a perilous 23rd in the Champions League standings after five of their eight league-phase matches (the top 24 advance to the knockout phase which begins in February) and already on their second head coach of the season (Sebastien Pocognoli having succeeded Adi Hutter in October), Pogba has his work cut out to get the club from the Mediterannean-coast principality moving in the right direction. But having finally brought his long spell in exile to an end, one of French football’s most famous sons now has an opportunity to make a mark on the club game in his home country for the very first time. Contrary to the vast majority of French greats – such as Raymond Kopa, Michel Platini, Zinedine Zidane, Thierry Henry, Karim Benzema and Kylian Mbappe – Pogba made a name for himself as a player without having played a single league game in the country of his birth. His comeback against Rennes represented the first time he had taken part in an official domestic fixture in France since his final outing for Le Havre Under-17s over 16 years earlier. He was a long-limbed 13-year-old when he first caught the attention of the youth scouts at the club from the Normandy coast, whose celebrated academy also counts Lassana Diarra, Charles N’Zogbia, Steve Mandanda and Dimitri Payet among its alumni. Born to parents from Guinea, west Africa, Pogba grew up in Roissy-en-Brie in Paris’ south-eastern suburbs and was playing for local side US Torcy when he was first spotted by Le Havre scout Oualid Tanazefti in September 2006. Tanazefti, who would go on to become Pogba’s first advisor, immediately tipped off his boss, Le Havre’s head of youth recruitment Franck Sale. Advertisement “I went to see him play, and he gave off something straight away, ” Sale tells The Athletic. “He was already tall and rangy for his age, and you could see that he was an athlete. He had a very good relationship with the ball, and there was something really interesting about his game intelligence, his positioning and his work rate. ” Pogba signed for Le Havre in 2007 and would spend two years there, living in a spartan dormitory at the club’s academy in the city centre. Nordine Raho coached him at under-17s level and was impressed both by his “phenomenal” footballing ability and his unusually supportive attitude. “At that age, 16-17, they tend to be either a bit shy or a bit crazy, ” Raho says. “But he was already assured and smiley. He looked after other people — and that struck me. “Often in academies at professional clubs it’s a little bit ‘Every man for himself’, but although he wanted to turn pro and he wanted to succeed, he didn’t want that at the expense of other players. He never put other players down — he was always giving them advice and encouraging them. You felt that he was the boss of the team. ” It was during his time at Le Havre that Pogba was first capped by France, at under-16 level, lining up in a team that also featured fellow future professionals in Alphonse Areola, Lucas Digne, Geoffrey Kondogbia and Abdoulaye Doucoure. But his spell at the club came to an abrupt end in July 2009, when he agreed to join Manchester United. His decision created huge controversy at the time and still rankles in some quarters today. Le Havre cried foul, accusing United of “stealing” Pogba by offering “very large sums of money” to his parents. It took a favourable ruling by world football’s governing body FIFA and several months of negotiations before a confidential agreement between the clubs was eventually reached the following June. United have always denied any accusations of improper conduct regarding Pogba’s signing. Jean-Pierre Louvel, Le Havre’s president at the time, has made it clear that the bad taste left by Pogba’s departure still lingers, telling French newspaper L’Equipe earlier this year: “He had no reason to leave and he was removed from a favourable environment for money. ” Advertisement Sale believes that the truth is more nuanced, pointing to the fact that although Pogba was bound by what is known in France as a ‘non-solicitation agreement’, preventing him from joining another French club, he was still to sign a professional contract with Le Havre. “It was never a financial matter with Paul, ” he says. “Other clubs were offering him a pro contract, but signing 16-year-olds to professional contracts wasn’t yet the done thing in French football. I’m sure that if we’d put a pro contract in front of him, he’d have signed it straight away. ” Pogba left France at age 16, having failed to make a single first-team appearance for Le Havre. As a consequence, French football fans had to build a relationship with him from a distance, initially getting to know him as the strutting, all-action midfielder who burst onto the scene with Juventus in 2012 and then slowly developing an attachment to him via his performances for the national team. By the time Pogba captained France to victory at the Under-20 World Cup in 2013, he had already been handed his senior international debut by Didier Deschamps. Yet although he featured prominently as the team reached the quarter-finals of the 2014 World Cup, beaten 1-0 by eventual champions Germany, and lost to Portugal, on home soil, in the final of the European Championship two years later, some French supporters complained that the Pogba who lined up for his country seemed a pale imitation of the one who so frequently dazzled at club level. After a goalless draw with minnows Luxembourg in a World Cup qualifier in Toulouse in September 2017, 69 per cent of respondents to a poll held by France Football magazine said Pogba did not deserve to be an automatic starter for France. Two weeks before the World Cup the following summer, he was booed by home fans in Nice during a 3-1 friendly win against Italy. But that 2018 World Cup turned him into a national icon. Advertisement Playing a simpler, more pared-down version of his usual game, Pogba shone in Russia alongside N’Golo Kante in a two-man midfield, bringing crucial balance to Deschamps’ starting XI. “I want to win this World Cup, and you have to make sacrifices, ” he told reporters a few days before scoring France’s third goal in a 4-2 victory against Croatia in the final. Off the pitch, he seemed to have gained in maturity too, speaking engagingly at press conferences (an exercise he had previously dodged for four years while on international duty) and surprising his team-mates with a succession of stirring pre-match speeches. Whatever the future was to hold beyond that point, Pogba’s place in French football history was secure. After initial talks at the start of the year, Pogba’s move to Monaco began to take shape on a clandestine visit to the principality on May 13, during which he met owner Dmitry Rybolovlev, chief executive Thiago Scuro, technical director Carlos Avina and then head coach Hutter. Pogba was given a tour of the club’s facilities and is said to have been impressed by Monaco’s recently rebuilt performance centre, just across the border between the principality and France, at La Turbie, the stunning converted quarry overlooking the Mediterranean that has been their training base since 1981. He and his wife Zulay, a Bolivian model, were also taken to see local housing options for their family and shown potential schools for their three young sons. He was free to sign for a new club having been released by Juventus at the end of November 2024 while still serving his ban, and had been authorised to resume his playing career in March this year after the Court of Arbitration for Sport reduced his doping ban. But despite reports of interest from France, Spain, Saudi Arabia and the United States, he deliberately took his time in choosing a destination. With its tranquil surroundings and state-of-the-art medical facilities, Monaco met crucial criteria for a player whose recent years have been plagued by off-pitch turmoil and recurrent injury problems. “He knows he’ll be able to work in peace here, ” says one club source, speaking on condition of anonymity to protect relationships. Pogba sounded out several former team-mates who had previously played for Monaco, including Kondogbia, Mbappe and Benjamin Mendy, before committing his future to the club. Advertisement Pogba’s recruitment formed part of Monaco’s plan to add age and experience to a talented but callow squad whose naivety was badly exposed at times last season, most notably in a chaotic 4-3 aggregate defeat by Benfica in the Champions League play-off round to decide who advanced to the last 16 (Monaco lost the home leg 1-0, then led twice in the decider in Lisbon, only to concede equalisers). “We want him to be a leader inside the club, ” Scuro tells The Athletic. “Since 2023, we’ve been reorganising the squad by making it very young, very talented and very energetic. It was the right moment to bring in top personalities like Paul and (31-year-old former Tottenham Hotspur, Bayern Munich and England defender) Eric Dier to give us more maturity for the season ahead. ” Pogba may have come to Monaco in search of the quiet life, but the day he signed his contract made headlines around the world after he unexpectedly burst into tears at the moment of putting pen to paper on a two-year deal in Scuro’s office. “It’s rare to see me cry like that. I hope you made the most of it! ” he told his introductory press conference a few days later. “A huge amount of images came to mind. You know the story: the doping, the injuries, etc. I couldn’t hold it in. But it was a moment of joy as well. ” He praised his wife for keeping him going during his long spell in the wilderness and said that the thought of enabling his sons to see their father in action for the first time had been an additional source of motivation. Pogba has described the prospect of making his Ligue 1 debut as “a pleasure and an honour”. “I really liked the project (at Monaco), even just in terms of the conditions: everyday life, being in France, playing in Ligue 1, which I’ve never done before, ” he told the club website. “It ticked a huge amount of boxes. ” After leaving Juventus, Pogba relocated to Miami, in the U. S. state of Florida, and spent much of his time there working intensively with a fitness coach, Roger Caibe Rodriguez. But Monaco’s medical staff, mindful of the lengthy lay-off and his injury history, were determined to ease their new signing back into action as carefully as possible. Advertisement He spent most of his time working in the gym during the club’s pre-season training camp at St George’s Park, headquarters of the England national team, and only began taking part in full training towards the end of September. Twice his comeback was aborted — a thigh issue ruling him out of the trip to Angers on October 18, a sprained ankle doing the same for the visit of Paris FC two weeks later — before the game at Rennes proved third time lucky. He is expected to make his home debut against Ligue 1 and European champions Paris Saint-Germain today (Saturday). Behind the scenes, Monaco’s staff have been impressed by Pogba’s humility and his willingness to make time for people. Sources cite spontaneous conversations with young fans at club events and the patience he has shown while supporters clamour for selfies after training sessions and games. He has embraced his role as the squad’s big brother, notably offering advice to Maghnes Akliouche on what to expect following the 23-year-old winger’s first senior call-up by France in September. “He’s an idol for the current generation of young players, ” says Scuro. “When you’re a 20-something player starting your career and you have a chance to see your idol every day, it’s special. When you see Paul Pogba arriving (at training) before everyone else and leaving after everyone else, working very hard, two sessions a day, to be able to get back on the pitch, it’s inspirational. “And his personality is pretty special. He talks to everyone at the training ground, and he gives people a lot of attention and respect — it doesn’t matter what kind of job they do. He brings a good energy to the building. ” In true Pogba fashion, he caught the eye even before he set foot back on the pitch, donning a retro 1990s Monaco home shirt for their opening league fixture of the season against his old club Le Havre in August and hitting the headlines in September by correctly predicting that fellow new recruit Ansu Fati would score twice in a game against Metz. He’s used this new phase of his career as an opportunity to expand his business interests too, launching a jewellery collection with his wife and releasing a clothing range called Pogba MDXCIII (the Roman numerals for 1593, reflecting his birth date of March 15, 1993). Also, inevitably, he has featured prominently in publicity material for the French league’s new in-house TV channel, Ligue 1+, which was hastily launched over the summer after the collapse of a broadcast rights deal with DAZN. It is over three-and-a-half years since Pogba made the most recent of his 91 appearances for France in a March 2022 friendly against South Africa, but he has made no secret of his desire to resurrect his international career in time for the World Cup next June, joking during his Monaco unveiling that Deschamps had told him he could return to the squad “whenever you want”. Approaching eight years on from touching the sky with that triumph against Croatia in Moscow, one of football’s biggest characters has set his sights on the game’s highest summit once again. Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Play today's puzzle Tom Williams is a freelance writer for The Athletic, covering French football