BENJAMIN Mendy’s sad, lonely life in Poland has been revealed after the former Manchester City star was acquitted of eight rape charges.
Mendy’s life has radically altered from being the world’s most expensive defender and earning £500,000 a month while playing in the Premier League.
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Life is very different now for French footballer Benjamin Mendy Credit: AFP
Mendy, left, with Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola, once earned £500,000 a month Credit: PA
Life is very different now as locals have seen him push round a shopping cart in a supermarket in the small Polish city of Szczecin, where the 31-year-old now lives.
The Frenchman’s days at Man City are long gone as he now plays for Pogon Szczecin in Poland’s top league, the Ekstraklasa, where he earns £10,000 a month.
That might be a tidy sum for many Brits struggling with the cost of living but in football terms that’s nothing much.
Things went decidedly pear-shaped five years ago following allegations of sex attacks during parties at his £4.8million mansion in the Cheshire village of Mottram St Andrew.
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He was accused of turning the pursuit of women for sex into a game and faced two trials before being cleared of eight counts of rape, attempted rape and sexual assault in July 2023.
Many of the revelations about his private life were certainly unedifying, including a boast he had slept with 10,000 women.
Even his barrister described his behaviour as “morally dubious” and “callous”.
Manchester City, believing he was partly to blame for bringing his troubles upon himself, washed their hands of him.
As his legal problems mounted, he didn’t play a game in two years.
He first signed for Lorient in France and feminist groups and fans mounted protests, even though he had been acquitted, unfurling banners at the Stade du Moustoir, saying: “No rapists in our stadiums” and “Let the world of football clean up their ranks”.
Mendy played just 15 minutes for the side before seeking a new club.
He then joined FC Zurich in Switzerland but also faced a hostile reaction with a women’s charity of accusing the club of contributing to “rape culture”.
In the five months he was at the club, he made just eight appearances before leaving by mutual agreement.
Then last summer he ended up in the region of Pomerania near Poland’s Baltic coast.
Fans, half-jokingly, call him the Pride of Pomerania although so far he has given them little to be proud about.
Mendy has been hit with injury and a lack of fitness and has hardly appeared on the pitch and the club seems to use him more as a marketing tool.
Despite a lack of heroics on the field, his time in Poland seems to have done him some good and pals claim he is a new man as well as a humbler one.
One friend told the Daily Mail: “The young players are in awe of him because of the World Cup and he always finds time to help them and ask how they’re doing.
“He’s never arrogant, just always friendly and down to earth. He never plays the big man.”
