Non-Boro Football

[Changing Times 12,347]

51 minutes ago, Old Codger said:

Ince confirmed as Reading manager on "permanent" basis 

Good luck to him but that's a difficult job he's got there.

[wilsoncgp 9,283]

1 hour ago, Youngy228 said:

Jake Daniels from Blackpool is the championship player who has come out as gay. 
 

I personally don’t think it should be a big thing but clearly it is. 
 

I hope his name is applauded when teams read out at grounds next year. 

I applaud the lad for coming out into this environment. It's a brave thing to do but it has started to feel more like the time is right for it to happen. There's much more support for him than there would have been for Justin Fashanu 30 odd years ago but he almost certainly will burden himself with the absolute worst in society, especially if he's on social media.

It's a lot of weight for relatively young shoulders to bear so I hope that Blackpool as a club are united behind him and willing and able to give him strength, when and where he needs it. It's one thing for the football world to make their statements right now (I had to laugh at FIFA joining in, the association who are set to host the next World Cup in 6 months time where homosexuality is illegal) but I would imagine where the lad will really need support is wherever he plays his football during his career. It's important that the leaders he works with, the managers, the players, particularly the captains, are strong allies in the face of the trash that may well come his way.

Here's hoping that we don't have to wait another 30 years before statements like this are no longer needed, that the lads in the dressing room don't feel like they have to disclose it but are free to talk about it. The sooner the stigma dies, the better.

[Changing Times 12,347]

1 hour ago, Neverbefore said:

It's a big thing when you consider how many homophobic chants you hear in stands, how many times you see homophobic slurs in social media. The stigma is very much still there, in football more than in most areas of society. 

It's brave because it's a 100% guarantee that he's going to get abuse about it for the rest of his career. I just hope the positive response he gets from it outweighs that and that many more can follow in his footsteps without feeling afraid of being who they are.

Fair play to the lad

In fairness, you don't really hear those chants as much or as vociferously as in the past.  Even the fairly recent past really, you'd hear more 10/20 years ago without question.  It's not where it needs to be of course but it's getting there.

In terms of social media, and I'm not an expert obviously, I just looked at the tweet from Blackpool FC about it, then read the replies.  Almost every negative one appears to be from outside the UK, from countries where you'd expect them to be from.  UK based tweets were overwhelmingly positive towards the lad from what I could see, which I'd say is a positive in itself 👍

[estonpidge 1,449]

He's a 17year old U19s player, well done him for standing up for who he is, but I doubt that he'll be first team next season.

[Brunners 7,982]

7 minutes ago, estonpidge said:

He's a 17year old U19s player, well done him for standing up for who he is, but I doubt that he'll be first team next season.

Made his debut at the end of this season and scored 30 goals for U18s this year, so you never know.

[Changing Times 12,347]

5 minutes ago, Brunners said:

Made his debut at the end of this season and scored 30 goals for U18s this year, so you never know.

Who knows, but with that kind of record at under 18 level, he might just be recorded saying ‘I love the Pally willy’ in a couple of years time 🙂

[boro-unger 3,870]

3 hours ago, wilsoncgp said:

 (I had to laugh at FIFA joining in, the association who are set to host the next World Cup in 6 months time where homosexuality is illegal) 

If i was Southgate, I'd call him up to the England squad, just to annoy the Qatarians

[Redcar Rioja 5,976]

11 hours ago, boro-unger said:

If i was Southgate, I'd call him up to the England squad, just to annoy the Qatarians

Think it would annoy the knuckle dragging Engerlunders even more unfortunately!

[MMC 1,000]

1 hour ago, Redcar Rioja said:

Think it would annoy the knuckle dragging Engerlunders even more unfortunately!

 

[AnglianRed 6,320]

16 hours ago, Changing Times said:

Who knows, but with that kind of record at under 18 level, he might just be recorded saying ‘I love the Pally willy’ in a couple of years time 🙂

Don't worry - when Blackpool are playing here we'll tell him to keep an eye out for that dodgy looking geezer who goes by the name of Changing Times. 😝

[AnglianRed 6,320]

55 minutes ago, MMC said:

 

 

Well if you were smart, you'd just create a fake account for the WC and call yourself Mohammed Jihad or Allahu Snakhbar. 

Remember - if you plan on being abusive on social media...never do it on your main account! 😉

(not that I would condone any such behaviour)

 

On a more serious note, it sadly is far too easy to create fake accounts. If one gets blocked / suspended, its easy enough to create more. Especially if you use a VPN. ☹️

[AnglianRed 6,320]

13 hours ago, boro-unger said:

If i was Southgate, I'd call him up to the England squad, just to annoy the Qatarians

I'd also ask Umbro to design a rainbow away strip. 

[kentucky 341]

Talksport  way over the top on Rangers , in eorocup, it's embarrassing .

[TeaCider24 12,642]

1 minute ago, kentucky said:

Talksport  way over the top on Rangers , in eorocup, it's embarrassing .

In what way?

[Leesider 1,076]

What on earth are we all going to do until July 30th?  Fixtures release are still 5 weeks away. I guess the Transfer Rumours will help of course but it seems a long way away. Cork City have a few interesting games lined up, Man Utd Legends (Clayton Blackmore included) on June 9th & Stoke City have a training camp in Cork in July playing Cork City on July 9th.

I suppose its something to keep the withdrawal symptoms at bay anyway!