‘I was living a lie’ Interview with only openly gay footballer
Collin Martin, of MLS side Minnesota United, is the only openly gay male athlete in America’s top five sports leagues, but he tells Sam Wallace that coming out was not such a big deal
Collin Martin is a creative midfielder for Minnesota United in Major League Soccer, an American footballer who was something of a child prodigy. He played in United States junior teams, the son of a cardiologist from the affluent Washington DC suburb of Chevy Chase. According to the players’ union which publishes each MLS player’s salary, he earns $95,000 (£73,000) a year, rather less than his team’s biggest earner, the Colombia international Darwin Quintero on $1.65million. He is also the only out gay footballer in MLS.
Not only that but Martin, 23, is the only out gay athlete in men’s sport in the United States in any of the top five professional leagues, and is a committed spokesman on LGBT issues. He came out on June 29, to coincide with Minnesota’s fixture with FC Dallas that was designated as a Pride match, one of many themed to encourage LGBT fans to attend and to emphasise the tolerance of MLS.
It has been four months since then and speaking by telephone Martin says that his life has changed. He knows The Daily
Telegraph would not be calling just to talk football, but is fine with that.
“I am able to have this platform and speak out and be a representative of the LGBTQ community. It’s something I didn’t necessarily think was going to happen but a lot of people are interested in my story so it has definitely been a new challenge to live my life more openly in the public eye.
“I didn’t think it [coming out] was that big of a deal. That was my whole point. I had been accepted by all the people that mattered to me. I had been loved by my family and friends. That’s all I can ever remember – just being loved and supported by them.”
That is a key point. Martin was already out to team-mates and staff, including his manager Adrian Heath, the former Everton, Manchester City and Burnley striker. It was just something he says that “trickled through the club, like any other interesting topic would”. On June 29, he came out in interviews and in an Instagram post and his life was never to be the same again. It has been, for him, an almost exclusively positive experience. “Nothing but support,” he says.
The Minnesota squad is diverse. Martin reels off the geographical spread: players from four South American countries, as well as from Costa Rica, Ghana, Cameroon, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica. It his preamble to his answer to the obvious question: how have his team-mates reacted? “We just have a crazy amount of different cultures,” he says. “As a soccer player, it has been cool to be aware that people come from different backgrounds. I have had some solace from the fact not everyone is going to completely understand where I am coming from. Or how I am living my life or my sexuality or my religion, because we are all so different.
“But at the same time we are all uniquely the same because we play the same sport that we love. There was never a time when I sat everyone down and told them. Which I think is important to know. If anyone had a problem about it I’m sure they would maybe say something to me. There are people who have different views but they have never expressed that to me.”
What are those different views? “I am saying they could. I don’t know if they do. A lot of that is giving your team-mates a chance, right? Because if they don’t have the ability to change their views or to treat you differently then they might be stuck in a space where they can’t be as accepting. And so when you give them a chance to accept, that’s a big step for them.
“If they are not going to be able to accept it or they are going to be pretty discriminating towards you, then that’s one thing. And maybe you have to live with that and obviously maybe one day we can get to a place where that is not the case. But for me I was done lying and done not living a life where I was open and honest with myself.”
This is someone wellequipped intellectually and emotionally to be a pioneer in sport. He is one of five siblings, all close, and his parents’ support has been unwavering. He was introduced to football by his brother Trevor, 10 years his senior. He trained at
‘I was done lying and done not living a life where I was open and honest with myself ’
Manchester United as a child as part of a Brad Friedel academy team. He played for the United States Under-20s against one of Liverpool’s junior teams in 2012 and if he had to name a childhood hero it would be Steven Gerrard. He went to college early, at 17, for 12 months before his first club, DC United, persuaded him to turn professional.
Through his burgeoning sporting career, he was considering his sexuality. He first sensed something different between eight and 10, although he dated girls at high school. He knew by his late teens he had to resolve the issue, and makes an interesting point that his awakening coincided with when he was trying to make the step up from reserve-team football to the first team. Might it not be the same, he asks, for others in football?
“I would say around 19 to 21, I did start to figure it out. It takes a while. That’s another thing that could be of note. You think of the Premier League, a lot of these players could be playing at 16, 17, 18, 19. Those years are so formative for understanding yourself and growing up. If you are so immersed in the sport, you are not able to work through some of these personal things that are going on in your life. One of the bigger things that helped me was that I had two major injuries in DC, so off the field I was able to figure out things that maybe I wouldn’t have had time to do if I was so focused on playing games and practising.”
The time out with a hernia operation and the breaking of the fifth metatarsal on his right foot was a blessing. He had fretted about revealing his sexuality because of the casual homophobic comments he had heard in dressing rooms. He says that language can be so dangerous for a young gay person getting to grips with their sexuality. Was there ever a time when he felt those attitudes might make it impossible for a gay man to be a professional footballer?
“No, if anything I was trying to prove people wrong. I always knew if I was better than the next person then there is no reason why I shouldn’t be in the sport. There were some tough times but I was able to compartmentalise a lot of it. So when a team-mate would say something really hurtful about someone who was gay it would really mess with me. But I wouldn’t think they were a bad person. I would never let it deeply affect me.”
As for the fans, he does not mention a single problem. He identifies Washington DC and Minneapolis, where Minnesota United play, as tolerant cities. Some of the fans are gay, but generally they “like to support the players first and also obviously they care about soccer just as much as any other fans”.
Martin has confidence in his generation. He says attitudes in the US are changing rapidly and homophobic remarks are now off-limits. I mention Justin Fashanu, Britain’s only out gay elite-level footballer, abused by fans, ridiculed in the media and rejected by his brother John. When I ask if he knows what happened to Fashanu, Martin says hesitantly: “Didn’t he take his own life?”
Why has the Premier League and English football not created an environment where footballers can be comfortable coming out? Martin thinks it over.
“It’s still clear to me that it is very tough in Europe to talk about these issues and sexuality – maybe more so than in America. But at the same time it’s clear that I am the only man in the five major sports currently who is out, so it is not that we are doing much differently to make individuals feel safe.
“Times have changed but to me a lot of those same discriminating behaviours and language are pervasive today. Suicide is something that is still so prevalent in our society and something we have to be wary of. It [Fashanu] is still a story that is important for everyone not only to remember but also to understand that people might still feel that way.”
Martin has missed much of the run-in to Minnesota’s season with an ankle injury, although he played in his team’s final game – a 3-2 defeat to Columbus Crew. They did not make the play-offs but Heath, 57, has done a good job and Martin has nothing but praise for his manager.
After the June 29 announcement, Heath discreetly asked Martin whether there was anything specific he could do to support him. Most of all, Heath treats Martin the same as he treats any of his players, just as Martin wants it.
What can the Premier League learn from Martin and MLS; a league that has no homophobic abuse and no great fuss around their only out gay player?
Ultimately, Martin says, a gay footballer would rather be out and accepted than having to keep that part of their life secret. He says not every gay footballer wants to be a spokesman for LGBT rights, but everyone wants to live the best life they can as an athlete, and in the personal realm.
“A lot of people do a very good job of, I’d say, separating their personal life from their professional life, so for a lot of people it shouldn’t be an issue,” he says. “They are so focused on football, it really isn’t an option to talk about a personal aspect of their lives. But for me realistically we all know that your personal life can affect your professional life and your professional life affects your personal life. You can’t separate them.
“To ask what we could do differently is just tough. A lot of that pervasive [homophobic] language happens when you are young. When you hear that from a coach or a team-mate, it sticks with you and maybe your brain can tell you, ‘These people don’t change and they don’t see me just as a soccer player. They call me a faggot and therefore I can’t get past that and they are going to think about that if you tell them [about one’s sexuality]’. It’s tough.
“There’s no right answer. You think that maybe someone could step up. Clearly, there is a lot of work to be done and clearly there probably are some gay players in the Premier League but they don’t feel it is their time and space to come out.”
‘It is very tough in Europe to talk about sexuality – maybe more so than in America’