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FC Bayern team photo: advertising for beer
Photo: Lennart Preiss / dpa
FC Bayern has been cultivating a tradition for several years: the team of the record German soccer champions gather at the Nockherberg for sponsor Paulaner, slip into traditional costumes, jackets and brogues and have their picture taken with wheat beer.
But this year, two players did not participate in the full program.
New signings Sadio Mané and Noussair Mazraoui also donned the lederhosen, but didn't want to hold a beer for the camera.
The reason: Both are devout Muslims and don't drink alcohol, so they don't want to be photographed with it either.
Mané, who has also had a contract very close by in Salzburg during his career, probably still enjoyed the shoot.
"I enjoy wearing lederhosen because I'm generally very interested in different cultures and their traditions," the Bavarians quoted him as saying in a statement.
Bayern had signed Mané, who comes from Senegal, for 32 million euros from Liverpool FC before the season.
Mazraoui, who was born in the Netherlands to Moroccan parents, came on a free transfer from Ajax Amsterdam.
Ribéry didn't want a beer either
However, Mané and Mazraoui are not the first Bayern players who want to appear in the sponsor photo without a beer in hand.
Even Franck Ribéry, also a devout Muslim, resisted this when he was in Bavaria.
In the 2014 photo, he, Medhi Benatia and Xherdan Shaqiri weren't holding up a beer.
At the championship celebration in 2013, Ribéry got a good beer shower from his teammate Jérôme Boateng.
However, Boateng countered rumors that there was trouble between the two.
"Everything is fine between me and my brother Ribéry," he said at the time: "It was non-alcoholic beer, so everything is good."
Other superstars have also resisted beverage advertising.
For example at the European Football Championship 2021.
The multiple world footballer Cristiano Ronaldo put away Coca-Cola bottles at a press conference.
Frenchman Paul Pogba, a practicing Muslim, removed a beer bottle.
ptz