Euro 2012: Nicklas Bendtner Given Ludicrous £80k Fine For ‘Paddy Power’ Pants Plug

Chris Wright

18th, June 2012

15 Comments

By Chris Wright

Both the cheapest and most effective advert Paddy Power have ever taken out

UEFA have announced this afternoon that Nicklas Bendtner has been fined a ludicrous €100,000 (£80,000) and will also be banned for one match after exposing the waistband on his ‘Paddy Power’ pants after scoring against Portugal. He has three days to appeal, but we’re guessing the ‘just my lucky shreddies’ defence might fall flat.

Just to add, this is the very same UEFA that fined Russia £96,000 (just £16k more than Bendtner) after a group of their fans beat the living snot out of stewards last week and fined Porto the princely sum of £16,700 for their fans giving Mario Balotelli the monkey chant treatment last season (in the same game, City were fined £24,000 for taking to the field for the second half two minutes late) – thus rendering Bendtner’s dumb pants prank about £63,000 ‘worse’ than aggressive racism on Platini and co’s ‘Big List Of Naughties’ pricing index.

Indeed past Euro fines handed out for racist abuse include Spain in 2004 (£45,000), Serbia in 2007 (£16,500) and Croatia in 2008 (£10,000) – which should give you a good idea of the sponsor-centric priorities involved here.

Makes you wonder if Bendtner’s fine would’ve been reduced if he’d have stuck something altogether less offensive – say, the ‘N’ word – on his waistband instead of a non-UEFA approved online betting firm (who, incidentally, must be creaming themselves over all the free publicity they’re getting).

*Sigh*

Posted in Euro 2012, FAIL, Kits & fashion

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15 Comments

  1. Abhijith says:

    Is it Porto or Sporting Lisbon?

  2. Bill says:

    It’s the UEFA knowing Arsene Wenger tax.

  3. SL says:

    Well we now know keeping sponsors happy is more important to UEFA than racist abuse or hooliganism.

    Look for them to top it when England get done because a couple of fans spilled onto the track around the pitch after a goal.

  4. Lucas Thrillson says:

    I’m guessing it’s not “free publicity”, but I hope for Bendtner’s sake, he got a lot more than £80k to wear them!

  5. Toz says:

    The fine sounds legit.

  6. Grant says:

    He should send UEFA 20 grand and say if you honestly think what I did was worse then racism, you should all resign. Either take this or fine Racists more and I’ll pay what you originally imposed.

    Balotelli should wear a shirt that calls for Platini to resign.

  7. DJ says:

    It’s ludicrous in the context you put it but on it’s own seems fine to me. He’s a player not a fan.

  8. Nick says:

    In case any of you think that Bendtner actually pays anything…when he agrees to wear something like this, there is an agreement that says “we will pay you X amount to wear this, and then pay the fine for you, whatever it is”

    Bendtner could care less how much it is..

  9. es90 says:

    He scored against Portugal, not Holland.

  10. Andrew says:

    @Nick, yes but that’s not the point is it? The point of this little article is to highlight how stupid and out of order UEFA’s priorities are with regards to being money grabbing cocks or sorting out racsim in the game. They’re not even being subtle about it, when they do stuff like this. They are blatantly saying “We Don’t Really Care”.

  11. Nuno says:

    @Nick
    Agree with Andrew and apparently Bendtner also received a 1 match ban, so it’s not so much “he couldn’t care less”.

  12. andrei says:

    the point of the article is blatantly wrong as it’s comparing apples and oranges: while Porto has no control over all of its fans’ behaviour, Bendtner obviously has control over his own actions.
    but I guess you can’t let logic get in the way of plugging racism into every piece of “news” related to this Euro, right?

  13. cupcakes says:

    @Andrei:

    The fines Jose Mourinho got for exploiting a yellow card loophole in the CL & claiming UEFA referees were biased towards Barça were ten & fifteen times respectively that which Luis Aragones got for racist comments, and both of them were resonsible for their own actions!

  14. James damm says:

    They will have paid him to wear the boxers you fools! you cant buy paddy power boxers! and the reason he was fined so much wasnt becasue he showed his pants it was becuase he was promoting unlicened

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