Interests are high when Poland takes on Sweden in the last group match on Wednesday evening. Where the Netherlands hopes for a favorable result for the Swedes, Poland hopes to qualify for the eighth final. In the run-up to the crucial game, the eyes in Poland are mainly on Wojciech Szczesny, who was caught with a cigarette by a paparazzi before the start of the game against Spain.
A few hours before the match against Spain (1-1), the Poland goalkeeper lit a cigarette when leaving the players’ hotel. The moment was captured by an observant photographer, who now sees his photo going around the internet. Remarkably enough, national coach Paulo Sousa keeps a hand above his head and places the blame mainly on the photographer in question. “The worst thing for me is that paparazzi are trying to take pictures of that,” he said during the closing press conference.
Poland keeper Wojciech Szczesny caught smoking cigarette hours before Spain drawhttps://t.co/RrZNeoU2lT pic.twitter.com/SngFlXPRfi
— Daily Star Sports (@DailyStar_Sport) June 20, 2021
“We must not let the younger players come into contact with such situations, so it is not good for the paparazzi to take pictures in that way,” said the Portuguese coach. “There is another way to communicate with the younger generation. We have to show the young people that smoking players are not role models. You shouldn’t do that. But I think the paparazzi’s behavior is worse than my player’s behavior. He did not smoke near us, but deliberately walked away.”
It is not the first time that Szczesny has been discredited for smoking a cigarette. according to The Sun that also happened during the time that he was still under contract with Arsenal. The goalie reached for nicotine in 2015 after a loss against Southampton and was fined more than twenty thousand euros by then manager Arsene Wenger. “He didn’t want anyone to smoke in the dressing room, I knew that. I went to a corner in the shower room so no one could see me. Eventually someone saw me and it came to the manager,” Szczesny said in a statement at the time. Arsenal podcast.
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