Toronto Maple Leafs forward William Nylander has apologized for flipping the middle finger at a TSN camera while seated in the press box during the Maple Leafs-Colorado Avalanche game on Sunday afternoon.

“Yeah, first off, I just wanna apologize for my actions,” Nylander told a scrum of reporters at practice on Monday morning. “It’s a lot of frustration, so I’m sorry about that.”

Nylander had previously taken to his Instagram story to offer a less formal apology to fans.

When asked about his frustration, Nylander admitted that he was struggling with not being able to help the team on the ice, as they lost their fourth game in a row on Sunday at a crucial time of year.

“Just not, you know, playing,” Nylander continued. “You know, I want to be out there with the guys, and, yeah, just frustrated.”

The gesture was found to be humourous by lots of people, but there were an equal amount of people who were offended by it. Some because of the middle finger itself, and others because they believed it came off as an unserious moment when the team has been struggling to string together wins.

Nylander, who hasn’t played since January 15 against the Vegas Golden Knights and previously missed a stretch of games due to injury, has been one of the Maple Leafs’ healthiest forwards since he joined the team in 2015-16. This season is one of two in his ten-year career where he hasn’t played in all or almost all of the games. The other was due to his contract holdout in 2018-19. The Swedish forward said that missing significant time is something he hasn’t had to deal with in his career.

“I haven’t missed this amount of time since I can remember.”  Nylander said.

Matthew Knies also spoke about Nylander’s gesture and injury issues at practice.

“Yeah, I’m not really sure what he was doing, I think he was smiling after,” Knies said. “I don’t think he meant it in a threatening way at all, and obviously he apologized right after. So, yeah, there’s a little bit of frustration obviously, you know, piled up right now, so we’ve just got to get out of it and not let that frustration get the best of us.”

It was reported by The Athletic’s Chris Johnston on Sunday that the NHL would be looking into Nylander’s gesture, but it’s unknown at this time if it will result in a fine, suspension, or both.

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