The chief of staff to France's Minister of Sports has quit the job just a week after starting.
Philippe Mahé joined sports minister Amélie Oudéa-Castéra's team at the end of May, but reports in French newspaper L'Équipe state that “the transplant did not take”. It adds Mr Mahé will leave “by mutual agreement” after a week when the French authorities have come under fire for their claims about the chaotic scenes at the Champions League final between Liverpool and Real Madrid.
Ms Oudéa-Castéra has been roundly criticised for her response to the events at Paris' Stade de France. The sports minister has blamed "ticketless fans" for the trouble at the game, which saw Liverpool fans tear gassed and pepper sprayed. She later suggested Liverpool fans provided a "very specific risk " to the authorities.
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On May 30, she told radio station RTL : "What happened, first of all, was this mass gathering of the British supporters of the Liverpool club, without tickets, or with fake tickets. When there are that many people by the entrance to the stadium, there will be people trying to force their way in through the doors of the Stade de France, and a certain number of youths from the nearby area who were present tried to get in by mixing in with the crowd.
“The fact that the Real Madrid club has supervised the coming of its supporters to Paris to such an extent, by scheduling buses from the airport and organizing everything from start to finish — which contrasted sharply with what the Liverpool club did, letting its supporters out in the wild — made a huge difference."
Ms Oudéa-Castéra and French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin were brought before the Senate on June 1, when they doubled down on their claims that ticketless Liverpool fans were to blame for the chaos. Ms Oudéa-Castera said: "The time we had to prepare this final was short. We only knew the identity of the finalists on 4 May, especially Liverpool with the very specific risk their fans present us."
The French government's response has been roundly criticised and their claims disputed by fans and journalists who attended the final. Local and national politicians have called for an inquiry, while the Liverpool-born Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham has said all political parties and the Government should be asking for an apology.
