No, seriously. How?
Once upon a time, football players and celebrities in general existed in a bubble. We were very much on the outside looking in and had no means of interacting with them. Then social media came along and it introduced a channel of communication, a way to access your heroes. It was a gift, but was immediately abused by some. I guess hurry people hurt people and that’s ultimately why we can’t have nice things.
Maybe it’s simply a sign of the times and every team has a punchbag, but the trolling of professional footballers is becoming an increasing prevalent and nasty pursuit. I don’t know why any of them would put themselves out there in that way if I’m honest, but they should have access to the same privileges as everyone else, should they wish to.
The problem is that people seem to think that they can say what they want, whenever they want these days. That is simply not true. Elon Musk peddles this myth, the idea of absolute freedom of speech, but words should have consequences. You don’t have a divine right to spread hate speech and misinformation, often from an anonymous online account.
Embed from Getty ImagesYakou Meite is a professional footballer and you are perfectly entitled to judge him on his relative strengths and weaknesses. It comes with the territory. It you think he’s shit, and everyone seems to think everyone is shit these days, you’re entitled to that opinion, but I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want to know what you think. Players are their own toughest critics, so if he’s playing badly, trust me, he already knows.
Why would you therefore tag him when slagging him off? What is the benefit of telling him directly? To make you feel better because its certainly not going to help his form improve. You wouldn’t say it to his face because he’s a big lad and he would likely plant one on you. It’s just a truly spineless, vindictive thing to do and it’s becoming increasingly common.
In Meite’s case, he bit and made a very public gesture to his critics. It didn’t play well, but I can’t say I blame him. The problem is that it was at an away game, in front of the hardcore that slog up and down the country every week and its not them that are having a pop at him. The truth is that online is not real life, although it certainly sometimes feels like it is. What trolls are saying online often does not actually reflect the prevailing mood.
Embed from Getty ImagesFor the life of me, I don’t understand why its Meite that has become the whipping boy though. While stats are important, if you reduce players to simply numbers, there are plenty of under achieving Cardiff players, but that rarely tells the full story. Meite always puts a shift in and used to always be a smiling, positive presence. The footage of him celebrating the win over Swansea last season went viral, but now he slopes off down the tunnel and the connection between the two sides appears to be broken.
Meite is not the first and won’t be the last. Omer Riza was hounded off Twitter earlier in the season for making a tactical switch at Bristol City that backfired. It happens and sadly, so does the vicious backlash. Callum Robinson is flavour of the month again, but when he was clearly struggling for fitness last season, some of the things said about him on social media was awful and I like to think those same people would now be embarrassed by their treatment of him.
I feel the need to make one thing very clear. There is no such thing as a bad professional football.
Sport is a pure meritocracy and every player you encounter has won a sporting lottery to get where they are. You don’t fluke becoming a footballer, it takes a lifetime of application to compliment your natural talent. Injury, poor career choices and life in general can be your greatest opponents at times, but they all deserve your respect and support. We’re all supporters after all and that is our end of the bargain.
Embed from Getty ImagesNo one player is bigger than the club and they’re all ultimately passing through, whereas we’re connected for life. We represent the club in much the same way as they do. If they’re not cutting it, they’ll be moved on, but what about us? Are we fulfilling our remit too? We all pay our money, but the transaction doesn’t end there. We’re supposed to support the club and its players through thick and thin, so singling players out only adds to the problems and there are enough of them already.
Meite serves as proof that online activity has real world consequences. Once regarded as one of football’s sunniest personalities, his whole demeanour has changed recently. You may think that you deserve better than Meite, but if you’re sending him abusive messages online, you’re a far worse representation of the club than he is.