Xavi Simons has not boycotted the Dutch press, Arno Vermeulen knows. During the last international match, reporter Pascal Kamperman, among others, reported on this ESPN that the attacking midfielder of RB Leipzig would not want to speak to the press, but that reporting is based on a misunderstanding, according to Vermeulen.

The attacking midfielder is said to have felt unfairly treated by the media and previously refused to speak to the Dutch press after the Champions League match with RB Leipzig against Real Madrid.

“The story that Xavi Simons allegedly issued a press boycott turns out to be incorrect,” says Vermeulen. “After an RB Leipzig Champions League match, he did not speak to RTL, and that is not very nice.”

“After that there was a confusion of tongues within ESPN. Then it was said in another ESPN program that Xavi Simons had declared a real press boycott and that he would not want to talk to the press around the Dutch team. That is not true.”

“The NOS broadcasts matches of the Dutch national team and we had not asked him anything in recent matches because we saw no reason for it. The KNVB confirms that – if we had wanted – we could have simply spoken to Xavi Simons.”

“So this is actually a misunderstanding. It can no longer be stopped via the cut and paste sites that we all know. But it is not true,” says Vermeulen.

Simons also received a lot of criticism for his choice to no longer speak to Dutch journalists. That criticism now seems unjustified.

More sports news