Rodgers’ ‘good girl’ quip was clumsy... but don’t crucify him for it
THERE was a clip doing the rounds on social media over the weekend of a football manager being rather rude and discourteous to a BBC radio reporter.
After being belittled and then dismissed by Sutton United manager Steve Morison, Ahmed Nur — a matchday reporter for BBC London — took to Twitter to describe the experience as ‘the hardest day of my broadcasting career’. Listening to the excerpt, Morison’s approach to the gentlest of interrogations is not dissimilar to the manner in which Brendan Rodgers spoke to Jane Lewis, also of the BBC, 24 hours later in the wake of his Celtic team’s 3-1 win at Motherwell in the SPL.
This is what managers occasionally do under pressure. They buckle. Their good grace deserts them. They become caricatures of themselves.
The problem for Rodgers is not what he said while refusing to answer Lewis’s questions about Celtic’s up and down season but what he said in seeking to cut her off short at the end. ‘We’re done,’ said Rodgers. ‘Good girl, well done.’
It’s those two words — ‘good girl’ — that did the damage. It was those two words that saw Rodgers, 51, described as a ‘dinosaur’ and criticised for ‘casual sexism’ yesterday.
In just one breath, another run-of-the-mill instance of a football manager briefly forgetting his manners became something else entirely.
It was a mistake by Rodgers, for sure. A misstep. If he isn’t embarrassed then he should be. Sports journalism is a difficult and lonely enough space for women as it is without being patronised in such a clumsy manner.
But I don’t believe this episode points to anything particularly malevolent in Rodgers’ character. I have been around the Northern Irishman for a decade or so as his managerial journey took him from Swansea to Liverpool, Celtic, Leicester and, now, back to Glasgow.
Rodgers has always been one of our sport’s better men. He has always understood people and how to deal with them. There has been no sign of this. In Scotland, they say Rodgers uses similar language as a matter of course. Good man. Good lad. But ‘good girl’ carries a completely different connotation. If Rodgers didn’t know it before then he surely will do now.
Lewis is said to be unconcerned. So, as a consequence, are the BBC. She is 53 and has covered elite sport, most notably football and the Olympic Games, for many years. She will, we can be sure, have heard worse. This is not an inconsequential issue. Rodgers has made a mistake and if he hasn’t made contact with Lewis to make clear his regret then it will be a surprise. That would fit with what we know of him. Beyond that, however, this is a matter — arising from words spoken without due thought and in a moment of pressure — that should probably be allowed to lie on the file.