My fight against sexism from February 2011. http://www.fansonline.net/england/article.php?id=335
Assistant referee Sian Massey has been kept out of the spotlight for three weeks now, in order to deflect attention from that fact that she is, dare we mention it, a woman, as well as a qualified official. However, she makes her return to Premiership football today, now that the scandal and focus has died down a bit. But should the FA have done more than just stop her from doing her job, like come out and support her, perhaps?
Alex Dawson explores the issue:
FA silence does little to combat gender discrimination in football
If Richards Keys’ apology, come job interview at talksport the other week made rational observers magnanimous, Andy Gray’s silence after his sexist remarks made about a female assistant referee and a female sports journalist only serves to highlight the void left by football clubs, their governing bodies and representative associations of those who adjudicate the national sport.
As the story took precedence over the News Of The World’s phone hacking scandal, Gray was probably mindful not to leave voicemail with his solicitors in relation to possible civil action he may take over rumours that he was subject to the investigative journalists themselves. The £1.7million BSkyB will save by not paying Gray his annual salary this year could serve to silence the ex Scotland international indefinitely, as out of court settlements over the next 12 months will prove expensive for BSkyB and News of The World’s parent company News International. With such a high profile excuse to red card Gray, little will come of his subtle counter attack.
The FA seems to have no ‘Diagonal system of control’ when dealing with reacting to sexism in the game, and seem to only introspectively deal with discrimination in the sport. ‘Kick Racism out of football’ was a project that seemed to score with fans and was backed by clubs. However, there has been little evidence of the FA commenting on real time issues that have been addressed in the media and by fans. The FA is a savvy organisation and could very easily have immediately displayed their disapproval with the sexist comments made prior to Sian Massey having even lifted a flag. The silence from the FA has done nothing but produced a grey area on what the association feels about women in football. Why not decry the idiocy and threaten sanctions?
Without hindsight, the FA should have known that to have more impact than the probable anti sexism programmes the FA will no doubt roll out between now and the Olympic games, which has never seemed to suffer from a gender agenda, they could have reacted through the 24 hour news platforms with a rapid rebuttal of the comments made. Perhaps even provided one of the 2 female members of the 104 ‘man’ FA council to speak out and say, blow the whistle and call full time on sexism in football or expect penalties.