Zidane: I've done everything in football and reached my top after EURO 2000 win

Zinedine Zidane admits that as a player he had "done everything in football" a year before signing for Real Madrid in July 2001.

"In football terms, it was the top, because in 2001 I reached my top level. I was 28 years old and a year later I went to Real Madrid." Zidane confesses during an interview published Tuesday in UEFA.com.

"I had done everything in football. I knew that then I only had one year left in the national team. But I had been a world champion and European champion. You play to live those moments"

"Euro 2000? We were already champions of the world then, so we felt quite strong. The feelings were very positive. We had a more mature team, we all had two more years [than in the World Cup] and our players played in the best clubs in Europe. We arrived with trust and it could be noticed from the beginning to the end of the tournament."

"I don't want to sound pretentious, we knew it was going to be a difficult tournament, but we had trust. We were a much better team than the 1998. We felt we were a much stronger team. And we did a better tournament from less to more, it was perfect."

"Once again, the substitutes made a difference. It was shown that it was not a team of 11 or 12 players, it was a whole squad."

"Sylvain Wiltord and Robert Pires left and nobody noticed that they were not headlines, played their role and contributed. That's what the substitutes are for. In a great competition, it is very important that alternates have the opportunity to play do their job."