Neal Maupay has managed to start a feud with Tottenham Hotspur out of what he thinks is not very much.
It all started in January when Brentford paid a visit to Tottenham and suffered a 3-2 defeat.
Neal Maupay opened the scoring and proceeded to do the darts celebration. It’s regularly used by James Maddison.
The Tottenham midfielder seemed to take offence to it and made his feelings known to the Brentford man, who was on loan at Thomas Frank’s side from Everton.
That caused an uproar for reasoning that has even baffled Maupay because he stated it’s ‘not deep’, as he told talkSPORT.
When Spurs went 2-1 up at the start of the second half Brennan Johnson started mimicking Maupay by doing the darts celebration himself.
And since then, Maupay has continued to stick the knife in, including posting a picture of him holding darts after Maddison was left out of England’s Euro 2024 squad.
The 27-year-old is clearly a wind-up merchant of the highest order and he made it clear that he loves the ‘banter’ on and off the field.
If fans think he is going to stop, then they have another thing coming because Maupay said ‘I like to give something, but I can receive as well’.
But the Premier League hitman clearly thinks Spurs and Maddison aren’t seeing the funny side and he was ‘surprised’ by their reactions.
Neal Maupay copying James Maddison’s darts celebration
“I don’t know how people see it, really, but for me, it’s not deep,” said Maupay. “I am just having a bit of banter. A bit of a laugh. There is nothing personal. There is nothing deep. I like to give something, but I can receive it as well.
“For me, it’s just fun. I like a bit of banter with my mates. Just because I am a professional footballer I can’t do it. That’s how I see it. I don’t know how people react to it, but that’s just me. That’s going to be me, regardless.
On copying darts celebration: “I actually think about it. I score and celebrate the thing that goes through my mind, at the time. I don’t have one celebration, I like to do a bit of everything. When I scored, I was running towards the corner flag and I was watching their fans. They were angry at me because I scored and their team were 1-0 down. Straight away, I don’t know how my brain worked, but it just went through my mind ‘let’s do the darts celebration’. It wasn’t towards Maddison. It was just one of their players does that celebration, so I am just going to do it. That was even funnier (Spurs players taking it seriously). How do you take the celebration so personally? Yeah (I was surprised). I don’t have a problem with anyone. Before that, I was cool with Maddison any time we played each other. Relax, it’s just a celebration. There is nothing wrong with it. All of them players after the game came to me and said ‘blah, blah, blah’. I was like ‘seriously, you have bigger things to worry about’. It’s just fun. You need to ask him (if there is beef). I have no problem with anyone.”
Characters like Neal Maupay needed
It’s great to have players like Maupay in the game. As a goalscorer, he isn’t exactly prolific, scoring only six Premier League goals this season.
But he can see the funny side to that by joking about waiting for a call-up to France’s Euro 2024 squad.
READ MORE: Gabriel Agbonlahor laughs at what he’s hearing about Tottenham Hotspur now
The game would be much boring if there weren’t characters like Maupay, so yes, he should get verbals thrown straight back at him.
But it shouldn’t be something that is criticised, in fact, encourage it and the game would be a better place.
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