If our football is to be equal to men’s, we have to take a joke
AHH, remember the golden days of football coverage?
When Dick Stayed Up, Neville Wore Prada, and Young Boys had Wankdorf Erection Relief*? And God bless poor Dean Windass and Andre Muff.
Since time immemorial, we’ve been puerile. We’ve LOL’d at funny names, placed whoopee cushions under chairs and drawn giant phalluses over everything.
Not for much longer.
The Sun printed a light-hearted report last week about an FA WSL Cup quarter-final between West Ham and Chelsea.
Chelsea won 4-2, their scorers: “Harder, Harder, Cuthbert, Harder”.
Which, as fans pointed out, sounded a bit like “posh people having sex”.
Alas, Chelsea’s talented Scots midfielder, Erin Cuthbert — the Cuthbert — took offence.
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She described the story as “disturbing and embarrassing”, adding: “Wish people reported on the actual match and women’s football with the same enthusiasm.”
Granted, my colleague Steve Moyes’s story isn’t going to win him a Pulitzer.
But in a week of never-ending January misery, ongoing political sleaze and imminent tax hikes, perhaps he was simply trying to raise a smile over breakfast.
The woke pile-in began. How dare The Sun, which last week super-imposed the Prime Minister’s face on to a pork pie, be so misogynistic?
How dare The Sun, the first tabloid to employ a former female player as a football columnist — Alex Scott — try to have some fun? What MONSTERS.
Twitter’s rabid vultures, those who profess to #bekind while publicly flogging anyone they disagree with, saw their prey.
Some slated my fellow Spurs fan Steve, logically concluding a Tottenham supporter must have an IQ of a Labrador. (Just wait ’til Steve realises Arsenal WFC have a “Little” and a “Nobbs” in their squad.)
The Beeb, which should really be focussing on saving its own out-of-touch organisation, then gleefully leapt in. BBC Breakfast displayed the “offending” page, as a panel of woke, one-sided experts waded in.
CURTAILED AMBITION
Obviously many people saw the funny side. Sun Columnist Piers Morgan was one, writing: “Can’t believe all the silly fuss over this funny story/headline. It’s called HUMOUR.
“This kind of stuff happens to male players all the time. Get over yourselves, honestly.”
Of course I get the point that women’s sport, football in particular, has taken great strides in recent years to reach some sort of parity with the men’s game. It is long overdue.
Throughout my twenties and early thirties I played for a South West London women’s team — our great rivals were QPR — before a ruptured ACL curtailed dizzying ambitions of an FA Women’s League South medal.
As an 18-year-old, I also played rugby for England. Basically, I travelled the country playing sports. In other words, I understand the graft and talent it takes to get to the very top (of which, clearly, I had neither).
The professionalism and dedication these elite athletes display deserves respect and, crucially, more coverage.
So by no means am I trying to trivialise women’s sport. Quite the opposite.
As women, we can’t push for equality then cry foul when we are treated the same.
Parity works two ways. (And “Windass” will never not be funny).
*Dick Advocaat keeping Sunder-land in the Premier League.
*Phil Neville had a night out in Manchester.
*The Swiss club finished the construction of their new stadium.
WAY TO GOUGH
WITH the greatest will in the world, Wayne Rooney is no oil painting. Except, well, now he is.
The distinctive-looking Derby County boss has been flogging digital prints of himself – a.k.a. non-fungible tokens, or NFTs – for 40 quid a pop.
One for the Roo-genheim, perhaps?
AS we enter day 74 of January, February looks even more grim.
Turns out we should be braced for the coldest February on record as meteorologists claim an Atlantic influence will bring “more in the way of rain, snow, some wintry showers”, while some “blasts from the North are not out of the question.”
Splendid.
CIVIL IT SURELY IS NOT
CIVIL servants have been buying up luxury homes in Cornwall and the Cotswolds in the hope they can SFH (shirk from home) for ever.
Senior Whitehall officials are at war with Boris over plans to drag them off their Pelotons, kicking and screaming, and back into the office.
Their reluctance to put in a shift, when frontline NHS staff have been working round the clock, and blue-collar workers haven’t had the luxury of watching Phil and Holly while on furlough, is yet another example of how the pandemic has hit the working classes hardest.
IS THIS COCOA THE CLOWN, OR WHAT?
HAS there ever been a more 2022 story?
Mars, the maker of M&Ms, has “slut-shamed” Green and Brown.
In its infinite woke wisdom, it is giving the two colours a “progressive” makeover – ditching the pair’s coquettish characteristics and lowering their little white heels to make them “strong females reflecting empowerment”.
All M&Ms will now be gender-neutral and the non-binary, sugary little cocoa morsels will be “moving away from one body size”.
Because, obviously, we shouldn’t be fat-shaming chocolate.
Given that Gen Z, whom these ludicrous changes are evidently aimed at, wouldn’t dream of putting sugar or an E number anywhere near their temple-like bodies, this has “marketing disaster” written all over it.
ITV bookers. Please check Sue Gray’s availability ASAP.
Britain’s most famous civil servant would be essential viewing on this year’s I’m A Celeb – imagine the campfire tales.
And if Nadine Dorries can chow down on a kangaroo penis, so can Sue.
A BRIT CRUEL
POOR Britney Spears.
First she’s clocked shaving her head and thwacking a car with an umbrella.
Then she’s held hostage for years and years by her money-grabbing dad and doing increasingly weird things on Instagram.
Now, just to knock a girl when she’s down, Brit’s been compared to former Real Madrid footballer Esteban Cambiasso, who is now 41.
It never rains, it pours, eh?
MEG’S NOT SO KATE
ACTIONS speak louder than words – so take note, global poverty campaigner Meghan Markle.
Kate Middleton has started practising what her multi-millionaire, Montecito mansion-residing, private jet- hopping sister-in-law preaches – happily wearing a pair of £2.10 earrings from Accessorize during her first public engagement of the year.
This comes off the back of a £10 pair from Asos and some £15 gold-plated Orelia hoops.
And Meghan? Presumably she’s piercing her own ears with an ice pick, and wearing Claire’s Accessories?
Alas, no.
Last year she merrily donned some priceless diamond earrings gifted to her by “murderous” Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Last time I checked, “blood diamonds” were not for sale in Accessorize.