Wilfried Zaha To Stop Taking The Knee As It Has Lost Its Impact

WILFRIED ZAHA To Stop Taking The Knee As He Believes It Has Lost Its Impact 

Crystal Palace striker Wilfried Zaha says he will no longer take the knee before a match as he believes the symbol has lost its original impact and said the Black Lives Matter slogan feels like a target on his shirt, reports Sky Sport.

Zaha, aged 28, speaking during the Financial Times’ Business of Football summit, said the gesture was “no longer enough. I’ve said before that I feel like taking the knee is degrading and stuff, because growing up, my parents just let me know that I should be proud to be black no matter what and I feel like we should just stand tall”.

He added, “I feel like taking the knee now, it’s becoming..we do it before games and even sometimes people forget that we have to do it before games. Trying to get the meaning behind it, it’s becoming something that we just do now and that’s not enough for me. I’m not going to take the knee”.

Ivan Toney, the 24-year-old Brentford striker agreed with Zaha, after last week, when Brentford FC decided to stop making the anti-racism gesture before games, and told Sky Sports, “We have had a long discussion about that; why we are not taking a knee”.