Justin taught me to accept he was gay ... I hope Qatar will learn its lesson as well
Tragic brother’s legacy
JOHN Fashanu has urged England’s World Cup squad to take the knee in Qatar next month – not just for racism but for gay rights too.
The former England and Wimbledon ace admitted he used to shun his late brother Justin, the first professional footballer to come out.
Now he says gay fans should be allowed to be themselves at the tournament in the Muslim country, where same-sex acts are punished by up to seven years in jail.
Fash, 60, overcame appalling racism during his playing career and says more still needs to be done to boot that form of hatred out of football too.
He said: “If I was playing in Qatar I would take the knee to send the message we’re against all forms of discrimination.”
Fashanu believes the presence of gay fans at the tournament might help Qataris understand what it means to be LGBT.
Embarrassment
And he admits it took him a long time to understand his own brother – at one point even paying him £75,000 to keep quiet about his sexuality to save the family embarrassment.
Eight years after coming out, Justin killed himself in a lock-up garage in Shoreditch, East London, in 1998 when he was 37.
Fashanu said: “If anyone was to blame for what happened it was me. I shunned my brother. If I was like that with him, what was everyone else like?”
Justin was the first black player to be sold for £1million when he joined Nottingham Forest from Norwich City in 1981.
But it was while the pair were on Brighton beach in 1985 that John was able to finally see what being openly gay meant in those days.
They dug a hole in the sand and older brother Justin – who was on loan to Brighton and Hove Albion – told 6ft 1in John to lie in it.
Fashanu said: “He started piling on sand until only my neck was poking out. It hurt. I was struggling to breathe. Then he just left me there.
“When he finally came back I was in tears. He said, ‘Now you know what it feels like to be me every single day’.
“He said it was like always being squeezed. And for the first time I understood what it meant to be both black and gay at that time.
“Just as Justin made me understand that day, our fans can help the Qataris
look again at their own position on LGBT rights. The World Cup should be an opportunity to educate.”
Fashanu added: “Of course LGBT people must be able to be who they are but they must also respect the laws of the country they are guests in.”
He agrees with Foreign Secretary James Cleverly who last week said gay fans should be respectful of the host nation and “make some compromises in a... country with a very different set of cultural norms”.
Gareth Southgate’s squad is still undecided over whether to go down on one knee on the pitch at their first game against Iran on November 21 – as they have before kick-off in previous games to protest against racism.
But skipper Harry Kane will wear
a “Onelove” rainbow armband during the tournament. Fash, who is in training for the next series of Dancing on Ice, said the high point of his 17-year footie career was when he captained Wimbledon between 1986 and 1994.
The side, which also featured tough players Vinnie Jones and Dennis Wise, was dubbed the Crazy Gang and won the 1988 FA Cup against Liverpool.
Fashanu said: “We weren’t thugs but when we played we were nononsense hardmen. Wimbledon was our family. Now we’ve grown up and have families of our own.
“My only regret is it all ended too quickly. It was my happiest time in football. I wish Wimbledon had gone on for ever.” He does not have such happy memories of his earlier career.
In 1984, he suffered appalling abuse while playing for Lincoln City at Millwall’s home ground The Den.
He said: “I was the only black player on a bus surrounded by white supporters wanting to fight me. They were booing, throwing cups and food at me, using the N-word. It took seven police officers to escort me off.”
So it came as a shock when, three days later, he was transferred to... Millwall. Fashanu said: “On the first day in the changing room no one would shake my hand.
“All I could feel was hostility. The only person to greet me was manager George Graham. Great man.
“The first match was hell. The Millwall crowd hated me. Training was not much better. All the players were against me.
“When I ran to the right they played the ball to the left and vice versa. When I wasn’t touching the ball one of the players used the N-word. So I threw a punch and he threw one back.
“Then all the players pitched in and started beating me up.”
He reckons it took four months to be accepted, adding: “The breakthrough was when one of the players offered to share his chips with me.”
Now the TV presenter, who has dual British-nigerian citizenship and lives in Nigerian capital Abuja, believes not all of his ordeal was due to race hate.
The ex-gladiators host said: “When you’re the only black player in a team you can blame everything on racism.
“I felt I was targeted for being black. But it might have been jealousy because I was good.
“Millwall is different now. It’s rooted out racism among players and recruited more fans from ethnic minorities.”
Fashanu advises young black players to try to ignore the name calling and avoid confrontation. But he added: “There are still fans who scream racist abuse. We must educate them.”
The dad-of-four reckons one way would be for black players to invite racist fans to join them on the pitch, adding: “They could hardly refuse that kind of honour.
“Then show them on the big screens, laughing and joking with black players. It would make the others think twice.”