'Risk-taker' Depay unbowed by return to Saint-Etienne

Paris, November 5: Memphis Depay says he cannot be expected to prioritise defensive duties, claiming he will forever remain a risk-taker on the pitch, as he returns to a scene of a personal horror show last term.

Depay has scored seven goals in 14 games for Lyon this season, helping Bruno Genesio's side fight for a Champions League spot with the likes of Nantes and Marseille.

Les Gones are on a five-match winning run ahead of Sunday's Rhone derby against Saint-Etienne, a match in which Depay came in for criticism after last season.

He was given a paltry 2/10 in L'Equipe's infamous player ratings and became a viral sensation for all the wrong reasons, playing a backheel pass to nobody and seeing an attempted bicycle kick shot fall flat.

Lyon lost that game 2-0, but Depay will not change his ways as he returns to the Stade Geoffroy-Guichard.

"I take risks, sometimes I lose the ball, it happens, this is the football," the Dutchman told L'Equipe.

"If you want a left winger who plays simple, I'm not the good player. Of course, I can play simple, but I'm also a player who can dribble, create. If I look [at] me in the mirror, I see a creative player.

"The coach asks me a lot of effort, and I try to do what he asks me [but] I'm not a left-back.

"The most important for me, what is expected of me, are goals and assists. For the rest, I do my best.

"I've always been criticised, but the important that's what my team thinks. Others, I don't care about their opinion, they speak in the void. Social networks give them a voice, but I don't listen it."

Source: OPTA