Reading striker Jason Roberts plans not to wear a Kick It Out shirt this Sunday when Reading faces Liverpool this Saturday, reports the Daily Mail:
Roberts added: ‘I’m totally committed to kicking racism out of football but when there’s a movement I feel represents the issue in the way that speaks for me and my colleagues, then I will happily support it. ‘I think people feel let down by what used to be called “Let’s Kick Racism Out of Football”.’
Roberts also said that Terry’s apology has come ‘a year too late’ and the FA punishment was too lenient.
‘The four-match ban was, for me, not a heavy enough sanction for what happened,’ said Roberts.
It’s not entirely clear what more Roberts would have Kick It Out do to help staunch systemic racism within the English game, but therein lies the problem I have with these kinds of organizations when they work at the elite level of professional sport. Whether consciously or unconsciously, an exterior group complete with shirts and signs and buttons that implicitly carries the responsibility for eradicating racism tends to take some of the drive and necessity away from the clubs and the leagues themselves to tackle the problem in ways specific to their organization.
Now the group, as Roberts points out, seems to have shied away from serious intervention in recent cases this year. Far better would be for the organization to act as a mandatory consultant with clubs, and perhaps as a more silent whistleblower program for the 91 professional clubs throughout the country. Meanwhile any public displays against racist behaviour (t-shirts and the like) should be left to the individual clubs, and should be mandatory. Why not Liverpool Against Racism for example? Or the Premier League Days of Action Against Homophobia in Football? A far more powerful message, no?
Kick It Out does superb work at the grassroots level of the game, where resources are scarce and where youth coaches can act with less accountability. That is likely its most valuable work. It should not be a stand in though for the concrete action against racism required by each and every club and league at the professional level.
No one cares whether Roberts wears the shirt or not. He is an angry man who jumps on the bandwagon every time there is a racist incident in football as if he is the voice of the offended players. Vast improvements have been made in football in the last 2 decades in England just ask John Barnes. This is not least due to the great work of groups like Kick It Out. Sure more work is needed but what is not is Roberts now not supporting this great group who in this case aim to remind fans of the big issue in the week were we have had the terrible incident in Serbia.
In fact, John Barnes spoke this year of ‘passive’ or ‘unconscious’ racism still lingering in the English psyche, and once in a while it still translates into “aggressive” racism. He also said that countering racial attitudes in football was a by-product of the work of culture as a whole. As long as clubs, leagues and associations download that responsibility onto a third party organization, that culture remains unchallenged.
Yeah, that’s what I get out of this, Richard.
I think it’s great for Roberts to make a stand. By doing so, he’s put the FA’s feet under the fire. Why are they fobbing off the dirty work to some third party?
Additionally, this issue just got way more press than it would have for players simply wearing a token shirt in a one-time affair.
SB