Phone taps reveal Platini counted on Macron for help with legal woes after 'discreet' meeting

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French police phone tap transcripts seen by Mediapart reveal that former football star Michel Platini, who served for eight years as head of the sport’s European governing body UEFA, and who is at the centre of separate investigations in France and Switzerland into corruption and fraud, claimed he had been offered “help” with his legal situation by President Emmanuel Macron. In March 2018, Platini met with the French president at the Élysée Palace when, according to a French journalist and friend of the former France international who was also present, his legal affairs were discussed. The Élysée, meanwhile, has denied any interference with the justice system.   

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Former French football star Michel Platini, whose career at club and national team level was capped by eight years as president of UEFA, the body governing European association football, and who is now cited in separate investigations into corruption and fraud in France and Switzerland, told a close friend that President Emmanuel Macron “said that he would help me” with his legal affairs, according to police transcripts of a tapped phone conversation in May 2019 and seen by Mediapart.

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