Joseph Lasiri: ‘Me, Muay Thai, One, Monza, football, sacrifices’

When a sliding door opens you can know where it takes you, not what happens if you don’t go through it. With Joseph Lasiri, for example, it is not known whether Italy lost a football star one day, for sure it has gained an absolute one in Muay Thai. “The hurricane” on May 20 will fight in Singapore for the world title of the Straw Weights of One Championship – the NBA of Asian combat sports – against the Thai champion Prajanchai, but up to 16 years old Joseph “the art of eight weapons” does not he didn’t even have it in the horoscope. At the Lasiri home only the ball rolled: “We were four brothers, all footballers. I played in midfield and I was also good, but they always told me I was too small. Especially going up in category during the development phase, I was always less big than the others … “.

“One summer I change teams, we are in the midst of preparing for the Allievi championship, since I am new I am getting into a lot. The first friendly pre-season arrives and I also score goals. At the end of the game the coach calls me aside and tells me clearly that there is no more room for me. I feel so bad that I don’t want to know more about football ”.

Nail drives nail: Muay Thai is here

“Yes, coincidentally. There was a friend of my neighborhood who was very passionate, he always talked about it and recommended me a gym just outside Monza. I went in, and I never went out ”.

Muay thai, or Thai boxing: have you ever been to Thailand?

“The first time in 2013, I’ve been going there every year since then. I stop there for a while and train, I feel great there and I learn a lot. About Thailand I like the fact that there are no prejudices towards foreigners, in the camps there are many, and that the culture of the country is closely linked to the discipline I practice. And if you want to make progress you have to immerse yourself in that mentality ”.

It looks like a Van Damme movie …

“Eh, but a movie is a movie. This is reality, and it’s tough. When you start practicing a discipline you are animated only by passion, you are pure, you have nothing to lose. The moment it starts to become a profession, to get involved in big events, to make other people who work inevitably gravitate around you, it changes you. It stresses you, pushes you over the edge “.

When did you realize you became a professional?

“With the contract in One, the sponsors and the first important scholarships, Before they were never so high, so I always had to do a part-time job too”

“The pizza maker, the machine cleaner, the clerk for Swatch, the shoe salesman … I went to train very early in the morning, then from the gym straight to work and finally back to the gym because maybe I had a meeting at the end of the month and I couldn’t give up. Without money and sponsors it was hard, but I practiced the sport I dreamed of, I would have done everything to be able to afford it. Even when they didn’t give me permission to go to fight: I took and went everywhere the same ”.

What did they tell you in your family?

“When I left football my father thought about the classic teenage header, he didn’t take me too seriously. Then I started fighting internationally, in England, Spain and with the Italian national team, and I saw him more and more proud of me. They also supported me when, for example, I was in Thailand for six months: if I missed them, they were always there. My father and mother are from Morocco, and I always carry the double flag in the ring ”

He grew up in San Rocco, a difficult area of ​​Monza …

“As a teenager it was like that, after school we spent all our time in the playgrounds doing nothing. The spring to get out of that life usually clicks when you start doing something serious with no one forcing you to do it. It happened to me with Muay Thai: I wanted to improve myself, I trained more, I automatically moved away from certain environments, the results arrived. Sport is not that it just gets you out of a bad life, but as I said before it really changes you. For example, I was starting to do better even at school, I graduated. If you dedicate yourself, the results will arrive, that’s the lesson ”

Do you still see your neighborhood friends?

“Not so often because I train in Milan, but we are always in contact. The joke is always the same: ‘Eh, now you are no longer in Monza …’. The principles of life that I have found in my sport I like to tell them, as well as to my students “.

Between weight cuts, camps and specific sessions, combat sports require grueling workouts. Has he ever said to himself “But who makes me do it?”

“I told myself this every day. Maybe half an hour ago I was wearing gloves and punched in the face and half an hour later I was standing in front of a customer smiling and asking him what shoe size he wanted, and that was completely freaking me out. But now I represent a country, a family, a gym, there is a lot at stake. Even if I am tired and exhausted I manage it. Indeed, the more I arrive in these conditions of fatigue and stress, the more I want to win ”.

The 20 climbs into the ring against Prajanchai, number 5 in the world pound for pound and category champion. What meeting will it be?

“Very tough, against an expert as well as strong opponent, he is not the reigning champion by chance. Boxing is my strong point but he too is prepared from this point of view, he was a boxer in the Thai Olympic national team. But I am studying different strategies, I will give everything I have. I want to be the first Italian to bring this title home ”.

Since when hasn’t he been fighting here?

“Since 2017 in Milan. But sooner or later One will move from Asia … well, it would be nice to come back to defend the title “.