(Reuters) - Polish goalkeeper Wojciech Szczesny recently reversed his retirement decision to join Barcelona, but he is not about to change how he lives his personal life, and that includes smoking.
After Marc-Andre ter Stegen suffered a long-term injury, Barcelona convinced the former Juventus keeper to sign as a free agent. Szczesny doesn't believe that what he does off the pitch should be of any interest to anyone.
"There are things that I don't change in my personal life and it's nobody's business if I smoke. I believe that it doesn't affect what I do on the pitch, I work twice as hard," Szczesny told Mundo Deportivo in an interview.
"I don't do it in front of kids because I don't want to have a bad influence on them. Sometimes somebody will take a photo from the trees where I have a cigarette, that's on them, not on me.
"If somebody thinks that I will change the way I am in my personal life they can think again because I am who I am. I've been this way my whole life."
(Reporting by Trevor Stynes; Editing by Toby Davis)