The French World Cup squad have chosen a luxury city-centre hotel in Boston for their final group match — but one player will be barred from entering its bar. Warren Zaire-Emery, 20, cannot set foot inside the Aujourd'hui Bar at the Four Seasons hotel because of a strict Massachusetts law that prohibits anyone under 21 from an establishment that does not serve food, even if accompanied by an adult and not drinking alcohol.
The five-star hotel features a wellness floor, swimming and plunge pools, but the bar is adjacent to the restaurant of the same name, making it awkward for Zaire-Emery to join team-mates. The law does not affect his Paris Saint-Germain colleague Désiré Doué, who turned 21 on 3 June. Zaire-Emery does not turn 21 until March.
“France's Warren Zaire-Emery faces bar ban at World Cup hotel due to Massachusetts age law.”
France, runners-up in 2022, are based at the Four Seasons in central Boston — a departure from the isolated locations they used at the 2018 and 2022 tournaments in Russia and Qatar. They are in Group I alongside Senegal, Iraq and Norway. Their campaign begins against Senegal in New Jersey on Tuesday, followed by Iraq in Philadelphia on 22 June and Norway in Boston on 26 June.
This will be the final tournament for manager Didier Deschamps, who has won the World Cup as both a player and a manager. He has been linked with the vacant Italy job after the Azzurri failed to qualify for a third successive World Cup. Kylian Mbappé, France's star man, hopes to end Deschamps' reign with victory. "The best way to pay tribute to him is to win because he loves to win," Mbappé said. "We're going to make sure he has the best of the recent World Cups. Hopefully, it will be his last because I hope he doesn't play for another team."
Whether the bar ban will be strictly enforced remains unclear, given Deschamps' squad is unlikely to embark on boozy benders during a tournament where they are expected to go far.