Hatred in football is nothing new.. in the street, at games or online. As the sick abuse of Roeder proved, it’s utterly vile and illogical
THROUGHOUT Sunday’s televised game at Bramall Lane, the commentator repeatedly referred to Liverpool’s stand-in keeper Adrian as Alisson.
Sky’s Bill Leslie clearly had a mental block and his error passed without much note, apart from a few dozen mocking Tweets.
But had the commentator been called Wilhelmina, and not Bill, there would have been a torrent of vile abuse aimed at the journalist for being a woman who knew nothing about football.
That’s the kind of stuff that reduced BBC’S experienced rugby journalist Sonja Mclaughlan (right) to tears after she had the audacity to ask England captain Owen Farrell questions some fans deemed inappropriate.
Also at the weekend, police were called in by Derby County after their striker Colin Kazim-richards was hit with a volley of ugly, personal venom on Instagram which had nothing to do with the equaliser he scored against Nottingham Forest. Just the colour of his skin.
Neither incident comes as a surprise as race and gender are the go-to targets of trolls these days.
But we should not delude ourselves that they are the only targets and social media the only platform.
Once stadiums reopen the bile will fly from the stands, and as Glenn Roeder proved, it can have nothing to do with your race, colour or sex. Because hate is illogical.
The tributes to the muchloved player and coach who died, aged 65, this week, have been plentiful as he was remembered as a decent, caring man.
We heard tales about him, as West Ham manager, talking Don Hutchison through a fivehour car journey to see his dying dad and how, as a Newcastle player, he acted as a father figure to Paul Gascoigne. Gazza said of him: “He would put everybody before himself.” But in 2006, Roeder was subjected to the most horrific abuse which shocked even hardened observers.
Three years earlier, and in charge of a West Ham side in a relegation struggle, a bottle was thrown during the night through what trolls suspected was his bedroom window. It was his daughter’s room and it traumatised her. Hours later, Roeder collapsed in his office after a 1-0 win over Middlesbrough, suffering a brain tumour, which forced him to miss the final three games of the season in which West Ham were relegated.
Roeder recovered, and returned to Upton Park as Newcastle manager to be greeted with shouts of “tumour boy” and “why didn’t you die three years ago?”
He said after the game: “One of the saddest things was that when I looked at the faces of some of the people who were shouting at me, they were men in their 40s and 50s, screaming about brain tumours and death.
“Men who, God forbid, might find themselves in the same position as me one day.”
I’d love to think that those who baited that decent man, now in their 60s and 70s, felt a tinge of regret when they heard of his death this week. But, sadly, I doubt it.
This isn’t about a sick group of West Ham fans.
As Roeder pointed out, there were as many home fans clapping him on his return to Upton Park as barracking him.
This is a wider point about abuse and football. The poison doesn’t just emanate from keyboard warriors in their mum’s spare room weaponising racism and sexism to get noticed on Twitter.
It’s about people of all ages and classes, on streets, buses and in stadiums and it is nothing new. It’s about the fact that haters are always going to hate.
And as Glenn Roeder proved, that hatred can be incredibly, and illogically, vile.