Chelsea player is a “disgrace” who represents “the rot in the football world” according to powerful rant after Moscow visit | OneFootball

Heading to a pariah state to promote a betting company with a man who is wanted for drug dealing. It’s not a good look by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, it’s hard to imagine a worse look for a football player in 2023.

But Hakim Ziyech has manged to pull off the trifecta, and while people in the UK aren’t too bothered – these things all seem so far away – in Holland where Ziyech made his name, the knives are out.

The Chelsea winger was pictured this week in Moscow, the heart of Vladimir Putin’s vicious invasion of Ukraine, partying with his old teammate Quincy Promes.

Promes plays for Spartak Moscow, out of the reach of the long arm of the law, having been charged with smuggling £65m worth of cocaine into the Netherlands when he was playing there.

We’re tired of slamming Ziyech for his behaviour (which is at the very least insensitive, at the very worst idiotic), so we will let Sander Schimmelpennink, quoted by Sport Witness, do it for us:

“Cosily visiting criminal Promes in Moscow. That you are a stupid prole who does everything for money is one thing, but this is pandering to the enemy.

“Promes already never had to come to Dutch stadium again, Ziyech can also be on the list. The rot in the football world is also in the players themselves.

“Too often anti-social and primal money wolves, who in no way take their responsibility as role models. Promoting tax evasion, flirting with mafiosi, it’s a disgrace. Clubs need to throw out bad apples.”

Ziyech is of course not responsible for everything wrong in football and the wider world beyond, but the way he managed to get three strikes at once here is truly impressive, and enough to put most people off him.