The presence of the Italian World Cup winners Andrea Pirlo and Marco Materazzi in Russia for a sports event has sparked outrage. The former players signed autographs and posed for selfies with Kremlin supporters on the day Moscow launched one of its most brutal missile attacks on Kyiv.
Pirlo, the former Juventus and Milan midfielder and one of the defining figures of Italian football is now manager of United FC in Dubai. He was photographed on Sunday alongside the Russia striker Artem Dzyuba, during “Football Day” celebrations at Moscow’s Luzhniki Stadium. In March 2022, shortly after the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Dzyuba, the national side’s former captain, said he was “proud to be Russian”.
