Jonathan Rowe has finally shared his side of the story… and it is shaking Marseille. In an interview with The Athletic, the former English winger looked back on his huge fight with Adrien Rabiot after the 1-0 defeat against Rennes on the opening day of the Ligue 1 season.
Almost a year later, the clash is still making headlines. According to Jonathan Rowe, Adrien Rabiot was the one who started the confrontation inside the dressing room. “Things exploded. It was because of a comment he made,” the Englishman explained before delivering an explosive version of events: “The thing is, De Zerbi and Mehdi (Benatia), the sporting director, didn’t see Rabiot’s first punch at the beginning. They only saw me come back and hit him. So they probably thought I hit him for no reason. I had to explain the situation to them afterwards.”
Rowe Opens Up About Marseille Chaos
The former OM player insists the tension inside the Marseille squad had become impossible to control. “We were all on edge. Things escalated. These kinds of things happen in dressing rooms more often than people think,” Rowe explained. At the time, former president Pablo Longoria had described it as “an incident of extreme seriousness and unbelievable violence.” As a result, both players were quickly pushed toward the exit. Rabiot signed with AC Milan, while Rowe moved on to Bologna FC 1909.
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And Rowe clearly has no regrets about leaving Marseille. The Englishman even criticized Roberto De Zerbi’s training methods at La Commanderie. “Sometimes I got a bit bored in training because the build-up play mainly focused on the defenders and midfielders to allow us attackers to receive the ball. We would stand under the sun for hours.” Still, he admitted the method helped mentally: “You might touch the ball once every 10 or 15 minutes, but when you get it, you have to be decisive and create chances.”
Now playing in Serie A, Rowe says he has discovered a completely different style of football at Bologna. The English attacker, who has scored 8 goals and delivered 5 assists this season in Italy, described it as a successful fresh start. “It was a radical change compared to Marseille with De Zerbi,” he explained before recalling his cultural shock: “They played long balls. And I was thinking: ‘What are you doing?’ They answered: ‘That’s how we play!’”
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