‘Speak Out’ magazine – issue #3

The latest edition of ‘Speak Out’ magazine – the premier equalities magazine for Birmingham – has just been published.

Issue 3 takes a hard-hitting look at child poverty in Birmingham. Featuring expert comment from national campaigners, debate from local politicans, and views on the issue from real people in Birmingham. The issue also takes a look at racism in the beautiful game, the people on the frontline of tackling gang culture, and recent immigrants who give their take on life in modern Britain.

Hard copies are available freely in various locations around Birmingham city centre. An electronic version can be read online here.

Chris Allen is Editor of  ‘SpeakOut’ magazine.

Racism, Abuse & Intimidation: The Inherent Ugliness of the Beautiful Game

Despite having written about both professional and grassroots football on various occasions, in particular my disillusionment with the behaviour of some coaches that allege to be ‘passionate’ about the game, I was still shocked by a sorry episode that I was privy to last weekend.

As with most weekends, I went along to watch my 11 year old son play for his football team, Pensnett Panthers FC. Last weekend, they were up against Coseley Town FC in a Stourbridge & District Youth Football League (SDYFL) Division 3 match. For context, Coseley are a team vying for promotion, Pensnett are at the foot of the table.

The match began pretty amicably until Pensnett took an unexpected lead. Within an instant, the mood changed and the coaches for Coseley and their linesman especially began to ‘motivate’ the players. For ‘motivate’ here, feel free to read ‘whip them into a frenzy’ and/ or ‘intimidate’ depending upon which team the players on the pitch were turning out for.

Millwall Legend: Neil Harris

Last night, Neil Harris became the highest goalscorer in Millwall’s history by scoring his 112th goal for the club. His 1st came on 19th September 1998 against Northampton Town. His 112th came on the 13th January 2009 against Crewe Alexandra. Without any irony, Neil Harris is a true football legend.

During his two spells at Millwall, Haris has experienced many ups and downs. In his first season, he scored an amazing 25 goals having joined the club from non-league Cambridge City, playing part time whilst holding down a full time job in a Japanese insurance company.

In his second season, he won the ‘Golden Boot’ as League One’s top goalscorer with 28 goals helping Millwall win the League at the same time.

In the same year, Harris was also diagnosed with testicular cancer. He fought against it having undergone intense treatment and surgery to return to the first team little more than a year later. In the process, he set up the Neil Harris Everyman Appeal.

Support a Criminal but Never the Palestinians

The hypocrisy of the Israeli invasion of Gaza has taken a new turn. Somewhat bizarrely, this has happened in the normally anodyne world of professional football.

This week, Spanish side Sevilla’s striker Frederic Kanoute was shown a yellow card after scoring a goal and raising his shirt above his head to show a t-shirt in support of the Palestinians. The referee, Antonio Mateu Lahoz, stated in his post-match report that he had cautioned Kanoute for raising his shirt over his head in accordance with federation rules, while also noting the message of the striker’s T-shirt. The message on the striker’s t-shirt was ‘Palestine’: no more, no less.

A few weeks ago, the English Football Association decided not to take disciplinary action against Liverpool FC following the club’s public show of support for Michael Shields, the Liverpool supporter jailed for the attempted murder of a Bulgarian waiter in 2005.

In protest against the 22-year-old’s conviction, ALL the team’s players wore t-shirts bearing the slogan ‘Free Michael Now’ emblazoned across them, the Kop held aloft a mosaic with the same message, and the actress Sue Johnston, accompanied by Shields’ parents, made a speech on the pitch in which she called on the Justice Secretary, Jack Straw, to “do the right thing”.

The FA, whilst alleged to have been “alarmed” by Liverpool’s public backing f, decided not to press ahead with any disciplinary action.

Likewise Fifa, world football’s governing body, also confirmed that it too would be taking no action despite having contacted the FA over the events at Anfield. As their press release stated, any disciplinary measures were the responsibility of the host authority.

As a professional footballer therefore and role model for children and young people all other the world, you can support en masse a man convicted of attempted murder: no questions asked.

But stand against the brutal killing of hundreds of men, women and children and that sadly, is a completely different thing.

How misguided things are.

Everything on this site by Chris Allen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 UK: England & Wales License. www.chris-allen.co.uk

Redux: “Sol, Sol, wherever you may be” – football, abuse and human rights

Following a link to this story by The Spoiler yesterday and the directing of near 1,000 visitors to the site in less than 24 hours, I re-publish the post that has been avidly read following the news that Police have released photos of those being alleged to have abused Sol Campbell…

Following the abuse directed at Sol Campbell during the recent Portsmouth versus Tottenham Hotspur (Spurs) match, the former England defender said:

“It’s out of hand now…This is a human rights situation. If this happened on the street you would be arrested”

It is not the first time that Campbell has suggested this. Back in December 2007 when he, Alex Ferguson and Avram Grant had all been subjected to varying levels of abuse, he stated: