I'm saddened to have to break the news that the FA's Respect campaign passed away this week. Such a shame too. It was only a few months old but it became clear soon after Respect was born last year that it would be lucky to survive the winter.
Like Tiny Tim in Dicken's Christmas Carol, the campaign was starved of love and affection and assailed from all sides by the very people supposed to be making it work.
Let's take events of the past few days, both at national but first of all where the campaign is supposed to be aimed, at a local level. Near me in Sevenoaks, a referee in the Kent League announced on a fans' website that he was packing it in after a player spat in his face when shown a red card. The main thrust of fans' arguments on the site was that the referee was over-reacting. In Leicester, police are investigating an under-10s match after two spectator fathers fought violently and one was hospitalised. They were fathers of children on the same team and one apparently objected to his son being subbed..
In the Premier League, Hull manager Phil Brown's assertion that the match officials cost his team mountains of money because they didn't let him win pass unnoticed in the general bile about spitting, Wenger refusing to shake hands and Brown's claim that the entire population of the world is responsible for his team losing - rather than the fact that they're a crap side and play a 10-man defence.
Managers of professional teams cheat and lie for a living. They conceal uncomfortable turths behind a smokescreen of pure baloney. Ferguson and Mourinho are the world champions of this art, to the point where Fergie has virtually given up criticising refs because his credibility is shot. According to Brown, the booking of his goalkeeper for time-wasting was caused by Wenger's protests and changed the course of the match. This is, of course, pure bollocks.
And so the Respect campaign, so professionally represented by Ray Winstone in the FA's ad campaign, has died before it even took its first faltering steps. The truth is that it had already been deserted by its parents, who answer to the people with the money rather than anyone who believes football can be a noble sport.
1 comment:
Oh dear. I personally hope they continue to push it as the message might get through to a few people and at least it has highlighted the issues we face. Whilst many of your comments are true you can't stop managers criticising players and officials as that's part of the game. Hopefully the FA will act on issues where the evidence is strong, as they shown by charging Chris Coleman (your previous story) after this comments on Steve Bennett. The ref you mention in Kent was quiting the game at the end of the season anyway. What happened was wrong but this only forced his hand a few weeks earlier than planned and did the club not throw him out imediately which itself sends out a strong message that this behaviour will not be tolerated.
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