A father in Thailand has claimed that his son was dumped as a mascot for Chelsea’s game in Bangkok and replaced by the prime minister’s son, a report said yesterday.
Nine-year-old Noppadol Sudlapha was in line to walk out with the Chelsea players for yesterday’s friendly and had already gone through pre-match rehearsals, his father, Kriangyos, told the Bangkok Post.
However, Noppadol and several other children were later told that they had been taken off the list of mascots in favor of Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra’s son and the children of five other Cabinet ministers.
Photo: Reuters
Kriangyos told the newspaper that his boy was upset by the slight and no longer wanted to see the game between the English Premier League giants and the Singha All-Star XI at Rajamangala Stadium.
An official from beer company Singha, which organized the match, said parents had been free to apply for their children to be mascots, but not all had been successful.
However, the official, who did not want to be named, did acknowledge that most of the mascots were the children of VIPs or Singha executives.
“Had I been authorized to make the selection, then I’d have selected the prime minister’s son,” he was quoted as saying.
According to another report, Yingluck’s 11-year-old son Supasek Amornchat, nicknamed “Pike,” was also among the children who took part in Chelsea’s coaching clinic this week led by star players.
“It was a lot of fun,” he said, according to the Nation. “I realized how much more I have to learn. They are very good. If we want to get to their level, we need to train a lot more.”
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