As he was interviewed by Eurosport France Laurent Fellon, Johann Zarco’s manager and friend, said that the French rider won’t remain with Yamaha because of Valentino Rossi. “It’s him who prevented us from doing it” said Fellon.
Valentino Rossi replied to this accusation during an interview with Sky Italia. “I don’t get why he said that, it’s definitely false. I cannot prevent anyone from being my team-mate, let alone the rider of a satellite team. Much fantasy in what he said“. This sounds not true, because usually every front rider can influence the choice of his team-mate. And we all know that Rossi wouldn’t appreciate it if Yamaha trusted and supported at their best Zarco, who has been very often faster than VR46 in the last few GPs.
What surprises at Jerez is the fact nobody from Yamaha Racing spoke about this issue. Why did nobody reply to Fellon? Johann Zarco’s manager talked about Valentino twice. First he said to Eurosport France that Zarco will leave Yamaha because of him and then, when Italian journalists asked him whether he had something against Rossi, he said: “No, he’s very intelligent and patriotic, because he’s preparing the ground for his young compatriots, who will come after his retirement”. Then, Fellon talked twice about Yamaha Racing management, in particular about Lin Jarvis, managing director. Fellon said to Eurosport France something extremely bad: Eric de Seynes, Yamaha Europe chairman, tried to make Zarco stay with Yamaha, but nobody cared of him. It looks like Yamaha is facing internal fights in MotoGP, where the team doesn’t care of Yamaha, represented by De Seynes, but depends on internal balance of power.