[Ante]

Quit smoking, Kostelic urges Prosinecki

ZAGREB, April 4 (Reuters) - Croatia's World Cup slalom winner Ivica Kostelic has urged national soccer team's veteran playmaker Robert Prosinecki to quit smoking ahead of the World Cup in Japan and South Korea.
'It's in our national interest to make Robert quit smoking,' Kostelic said while hosting an anti-smoking telephone hotline.

'Look at how he plays and runs as a smoker. Imagine what he could do if he stopped smoking, no one could come near him,' Kostelic was quoted as saying in Jutarnji List daily on Thursday.

The 33-year old Prosinecki, now with English first division side Portsmouth, is key to Croatia's midfield, depleted since the departure of several internationals who helped the squad to third place at the 1998 World Cup in France.

The former member of Dinamo Zagreb, Red Star Belgrade, Real Madrid and Barcelona, is known to be smoking at least one pack of cigarettes a day.

In a separate occasion, national coach Mirko Jozic, addressing journalists in the wake of Croatia's second goalless draw in World Cup friendlies, also said the squad had no one better than Prosinecki at the moment.

'I wish we had five players who are younger, faster and better than Prosinecki, but we don't.

'We have to make do with what players we have. When you lack creative players in the midfield, it's up to attackers to work more and move around a lot, but this has been ignored,' he said.

Croatia drew 0-0 against Bulgaria and Slovenia. They play two more friendlies, against Bosnia in April and Hungary in May, before travelling to Japan.

They are up against Italy, Ecuador and Mexico in group G.

 

[Ero]

Kostelic? What the hell has she got to do with it? Don't get me wrong, congrats to her but she shouldn't criticize Robi for smoking, since he's been a smoker for longer than a decade.

 

[JureM]

Smoking is bad for you health....

 

[baraba]

Not to be a **** or anything but it was Ivica not Janica who said it.

 

[majstor]

Mi znamo kako je pusenje lose za zdravlje...

 

[Ero]

ivica, marica, janica, jovica bla bla.... isti racku

 

[JureM]

Robi must buy the packs that warn "Smoking may be harmful to a pregnancy." Thats one of the good packs, he has to avoid the ones that say "Smoking may cause lung cancer." Those are the ba packs to be avoided.

 

[Ljubuski]

Smoking has nothing to do with Bobi's lack of pace.

He ripped his Quad muscles early on while at Madrid. He never fully recovered from that injury.

Boka smokes like a chimney too and his speed is fine. If it isn't for one's liking, the countless knee injuries are to blame not smoking.

 

[CroatTommy]

yes yes i like where this is going lets not blame the poor cigarette companies! its not thier fault! its alll about the injuries! :tongue:

 

[JureM]

Well..you can blame the smoking....why?? Well Robie had a quad injury...ok, because of the lack of oxygen he is bringing into his body it forces him to get fatigued easier thus putting a strain on the muscles which led to the quad injury.....

But then again, maybe he didn't stretch properly...

 

[Ljubuski]

smoking is not helping him but the fact remains that the terrible injury early on in his career is the primary reason for his lack of pace.

again if smoking were such a problem then half of the footballers in europe would have the same problem.

 

[spwolf]

Ljubuski we can see you are in denial ;-)

 

[JureM]

denial ain't just a river in Egypt.

 

[Ero]

denial ain't just a river in Egypt.

JureM's favourite phrase, he's been waiting for months for someone to set him up, and bang, he fires it

 

[JureM]

Ero...it's been a long time coming...I feel so proud....

 

[Ljubuski]

alright I give up,

Bobi I tried man, now it's up to you to conduct the orchestra and prove 'em all wrong.


I guess smoking those Eastern European cigarettes didn't help. If he puffed on the mild Canadian suff maybe he'd be ok.

 

[JureM]

I wonder if he does the typical Croatian thing...dry the tobacco....shred it up...get some rolling paper and smoke it that way???

 

[spwolf]

jurem, never saw croatian doing it, but my hungarian friend did... he also smoked lots of drugs too ;-)... You cant buy tobacco like that in Croatia everywhere, but in usa, you can just go into 7-11 and get some tobaco and rolling paper

 

[JureM]

Spwolf...

My grandfather from Imotski when he was alive and my tetaks family in Prolog in Hercegovina used to grow their own tobacco, dry it by hanging it, then shred it and then roll it in rolling paper. I remember when they came here to visit, I was laughing because they brought a whole box of the tobacco and rolled away...I was like, if they saw you doing this stuff here they'd think you're smoking something else...

 

[spwolf]

yep, i am sure older ppl did it, but you cant do it anymore in the cities anyway.. our cops would jump on you anyway as soon as they saw you...i remember back in '99 when cops could stop you in the middle of the road for no reason - i used to get pulled over 2 times a day, once cop saw a cd player and thought it was a radar detector, so he screamed " radar!" and open the door and jumped in to check it out... obviously it was a cd player... then he looked back, and saw a little box of refreshners (like tic tac, some US brand) and he thoguht it was a drug so he screamed "drugs" and opened the back door... then my friend handed him a box and ask him if he wants a tic tac... so he just slammed the door and left...


freakin cops, at least now they cant stop you for no reason anymore