Marseilles (AFP)

André-Pierre Gignac, former striker for the France and OM team, is on a list of players pre-summoned for the Tokyo Olympic Games this summer, AFP learned from corroborating sources, confirming information from Canal +.

Laurent Paganelli, the Canal + field man, assured him during the Saint-Etienne - Marseille match: Gignac, who has been playing in Mexico for six years, could participate in the Tokyo Games this summer with the French Olympic team. .

According to information obtained by AFP, the former OM center-forward appears in a pre-list of players which was sent several months ago by coach Sylvain Ripoll to the CNOSF.

But that does not guarantee that Gignac will actually participate in the Olympics since this list includes around 90 names.

A source within the entourage of the player of the Monterrey Tigers, the club that Florian Thauvin will join next season, also confirmed to AFP that Gignac was very interested in the idea of ​​participating in the Games.

Ripoll will have to give before the Olympics a final list of 18 players as well as a complementary list of four reservists, who will also leave for Japan but will not have the right to appear on the match sheets except in the event of a withdrawal from the list. main.

All players born after January 1, 1997 can be selected and the coach can integrate three players born before that date into his group, which is of course the case for Gignac (35).

Ripoll should give his list for the Olympics in the first half of June, after the final phase of the Euro-Espoirs, for which the French are qualified.

They will face the Netherlands in the quarter-finals on May 31 in Budapest.

At the Olympics, the France team will face Japan, the host country, Mexico, the country where Gignac plays, and South Africa.

Gignac has 36 caps with the France A team. He has not been called up by Didier Deschamps since October 2016.

© 2021 AFP