SOCCER: Konate opens up on depression after deaths of Jota and father

France defender Ibrahima Konate revealed on Wednesday that he battled depression following the tragic deaths of his Liverpool teammate Diogo Jota and his own father, all while continuing to fulfill his professional football duties.

Portugal forward Jota and his brother, Andre Silva, died in a car crash last July. Months later, in January, Konate's father, Hamady, passed away after a long illness.

"There are low points; there's depression. You can suffer from depression in football, too; there's no need to be ashamed to say so," Konate told France Inter radio.

"It's true that I've often heard players say they were suffering from depression, and fans or people on the outside didn't understand because the players were earning a lot of money. But that's rubbish, and people shouldn't say things like that."

The 27-year-old, who confirmed earlier this week that he will leave Liverpool this summer, admitted that Jota's death took a massive emotional toll on him.

"It devastated me. I didn't have any interest in anything else at that point," he said.

"You go back to football because you have no choice. We are employees at a club that pays us every month, so we have duties. We had no choice but to go back on the field and play for him and his family — as well as ourselves. There's no way of getting over it, but you learn to live with it."

At the same time, Konate was coping with his father's deteriorating health, leaving him torn between personal grief and professional commitments.

"I didn't know what to do. I didn't know whether I should go home and stop playing, especially because the team needed me, too," he said. "I didn't know who to talk to about it, so I kept it all to myself."

Following his father's death in January, Konate cut his compassionate leave short to help Liverpool navigate an injury crisis, though he admits he was far from fully recovered.

"There was never a moment when I felt like I was on the mend. All of these tragic events happened so quickly, and as soon as I felt like I was getting my head above water, something else happened," he said.

Konate, who has earned 27 caps for France, is currently part of manager Didier Deschamps' 26-man squad for the upcoming World Cup. -Reporting by Suramya Kaushik in Bengaluru; Editing by Jacqueline Wong/Reuters