Hegerberg Ballon d’Or limelight tarnished by twerk request
PARIS: Lyon and Norway forward Ada Hegerberg won the inaugural Ballon d’Or award for the best player in women’s football but the moment was tarnished when DJ Martin Solveig asked her to twerk after receiving the prize.
Hegerberg, who helped lead Lyon win the Women’s Champions League last season, looked embarrassed and answered “no” after Solveig asked her in French to do the provocative dance.
“You’ve seen that I prepared a little celebration for (France forward) Kylian (Mbappe) so we said we’re going to do something similar. Do you know how to twerk?” said French DJ Solveig who co-hosted the awards with David Ginola.
Solveig was the subject of criticism on social media following his exchange with 23- year- old Hegerberg and quickly apologised for his comments with a video posted on Twitter.
“I’m a little amazed and astonished with what I’m reading on the internet, of course I didn’t want to offend anyone,” he said. “This was a joke probably a bad one, I want to apologise to the one I offended, sorry about that.”
Hegerberg played down the incident.
“He (Solveig) came to me afterwards and was really sad that it went that way. I didn’t really think about it at the time to be honest. I didn’t really consider it a sexual harassment or anything in the moment,” she told the BBC.
Arsenal centreback and Ireland international Louise Quinn said: “It just shows that people just come out with these questions or comments without giving it a second thought, and it must change.
“Women’s football is taking huge strides and questions and comments like this take away from those strides we have taken. Instead of the attention going to a worldclass player for her talent it will all be about Solveig’s question.” — Reuters