Normally, evidence is required to substantiate an allegation. But not if you’re a highly-paid Premier League footballer, it seems.
Chelsea FC footballer Antonio Rudiger alleged racial abuse in a recent match against Tottenham FC. Despite lengthy investigations by both Tottenham FC and the police, involving CCTV and professional lip-readers, no evidence to support the allegation of racial abuse has been found.
Chelsea FC stated:
"We support Toni Rudiger totally and unequivocally on this matter, and as Tottenham's statement makes clear, a lack of evidence does not mean an incident did not take place.
In responding to this incident, we must be very careful about the climate we create for players who experience and report racist behaviour.
It is vitally important that we continue to encourage all players, whatever shirt they wear, to report racist abuse without fear of doubt or reprisal."
Clearly, racism is repugnant and should be eradicated ðŸ˜
But that doesn’t mean that any player with their own agenda can make up any allegation that they like. No evidence was found that any racism took place. This is a non-story.
Rudiger slandered the good name of Tottenham and their legion of fans – at the very least he should be made to publicly apologise. In any other walk of life false claims like these would result in a lawsuit and/or police charges.
Pampered footballers should not be treated differently to the rest of us, and a stupid PC fear of “sending the wrong signals on racism” should not prevent us from dealing with liars and fantasists to the full extent of the law.
