Manchester City's Benjamin Mendy 'drank tequila' on morning he is accused of attempted rape

Manchester City footballer Benjamin Mendy told a court he drank “one or two glasses of tequila” on the morning he is accused of trying to rape a woman as she got out the shower.

Mendy, 28, was giving evidence to his trial about his life between October 2018 and August 2021, when he is accused of raping and sexually assaulting a total of six different women on five different occasions.

He admitted his behaviour was "unprofessional" and he has been "disrespectful" towards women, but denies seven counts of rape, one count of sexual assault and one count of attempted rape.

Jurors at Chester Crown Court heard Mendy had to sell his Lamborghini and stopped sending money to family in France, which was paying for relatives’ private education and homes, after Manchester City stopped paying him in September 2021.

The France International also said he was "not sober" on the day a woman accused him of trying to rape her in October 2018 after drinking the tequila - but said he "felt pretty normal".

The jury heard the pair had been out partying the night before with another friend - who had slept with the woman and allegedly told Mendy he could sleep with her too.

It has been claimed in court Mendy went into the bathroom where she was showering while touching himself, and tried to pull her onto the bed as she told him to stop.

Jurors also heard Mendy had house parties after being interviewed by police over one of the rapes and a sexual assault allegation - a breach of his bail conditions.

Prosecutor Timothy Cray KC told the court Mendy didn’t think "the rules applied to him".

Mendy also admitted to drink-driving after nights out, adding: "It’s not a nice thing to do or to say it.

"But at the time it’s like I was not thinking about all of that [stuff] that was bad - the parties, the Covid rules.

"It was like I was on the train and it was going fast and I just kept going.

"I kept going until I went to prison."

The court heard Mendy was first interviewed in November 2020 after allegedly raping a woman three times during a party at his home in Mottram St Andrew the month before.

After this he held at least two lockdown-breaking parties on New Year’s Day and 2 January.

He was then interviewed on January over sexually assaulting a woman at the 2 January party.

Mendy admitted police had visited his house on New Year’s Day 2020 to warn him about breaching the coronavirus restrictions by having a party.

Asked by the prosecutor if he got into trouble for the party, Mendy said: "No, I don’t think so."

Mr Cray continued: "Did you think that maybe you shouldn’t have a party the next night?"

Mendy said: "At the time, I didn’t think this, no."

The prosecutor continued: "You had parties because you had this lust for sex, didn’t you? That’s what the parties were about"

Mendy replied: "No."

Mr Cray also asked: "As a professional footballer, do you think your behaviour after your arrest was professional?"

Mendy replied: "No".

The court also heard Mendy’s bail conditions were that he had to sleep at The Spinney each night and not have parties.

But Mr Cray said Mendy continued to have parties at his rented flat in central Manchester, despite having "plenty of warning that his behaviour might get him into really serious trouble".

"The way you went about this was that rules didn’t apply to you," he added.

Mendy said: "I was not thinking at all. I kept going, kept partying".

Asked if he thought he needed to be "more careful", Mendy said: "No, maybe a bit but I kept going.

"For me everything was fine, I knew I went to a police interview, but because in my head I did nothing wrong I carried on."

Mendy later said: "About my social life I did a lot of things wrong but about women - I didn’t."

Mr Cray also asked Mendy about the evidence of a woman who said she had been prevented from going to Mendy’s cinema room by two men while her friend was allegedly being raped in there by Mendy.

He said: "There’s evidence from a witness that two of your friends stopped her from coming down to the cinema room.

"You sent [one of the alleged victims] a text that was read out where you were telling her in the bedroom 'Don't worry, no-one will come in'.

"The way it went for you when you were off with a girl your friends would come to stop other girls coming in and seeing what was going on?"

Mendy said: "Yes. It happened. I asked to have some privacy."

Mendy denied telling one of the women "All these women want to f*** me" and another that he had slept with "thousands" of women.

Mr Cray said: "The fact of having sex with many many women you didn’t really know, that was the way you were, the way you were living your life."

Mendy admitted he was "never really thinking" about whether he was giving women sexually transmitted infections, adding: "I just kept going."

Mendy's co-accused Louis Saha Matturie, 41, of Eccles, Salford, denies six counts of rape and three counts of sexual assault relating to seven young women .

Both men say any sex was consensual.

The trial continues.