Let's Kick Anti-Racism Out of Football

The Premier League has declared that matches will be stopped if racist taunts are heard from fans. When did grown men become so sensitive to hurty words at football games, asks Steven Tucker.

10 min read Some readers may find the game of football to be immensely boring. If you're one of them, the ironic solution might be to watch a game of football.

Rather than tackling one another, modern players often seem to prefer tackling racism instead. Evidently many ordinary match-goers are not happy about this situation, to judge by the number ofloud booswhen players take the knee for BLM before kick-off at various recent Premier League games.

October is billed as the competition's No Room For Racism Month, a period chosen tocoincidewith October also being Black History Month UK in the nation's schools. If October is the Premier League's only designated No Room For Racism Month, though, does that mean thereisroom for racism in the rest of the year?

Such a naïve, literal-minded misapprehension could get you carried off on a stretcher straight to prison. You'll Never Walk Again Last August, which it turns out is also No Room For Racism Month in the Premier League too, play was stopped in the opening match of the season at Anfield because a black Ghanaian forward playing for Bournemouth FC, Antoine Semenyo, complained to the referee that he had been racially abused by one of the Liverpool fans.