The first rule of argument is: pick your battles.
The second is: never argue publicly with a footballer.

Because however dim footballers may be, however uneducated, unworldly, unaware of politics, ignorant of the meaning of the word ‘subtle’, however semi-literate they may be, always remember: they are loved (ok, and also hated) and they have 10,000 times more followers on social media than you do.

I’d just like to say that there are exceptions to the ‘footballers are stupid’ rule, and Tyrone Mings is certainly one. And he laid into the Home Secretary, Priti Patel, and rightly so. She’s horrible. Which, in fact, is her right to be. A bullying harridan, she jumped totally onto the Brexit bandwagon, which then had to be re-built because it broke under the weight. But then she referred to football players ‘taking the knee’ before games as “gesture politics”. Which, especially for a ‘person of colour of the non-white variety’ is a fairly silly thing to say. She said that fans who boo and jeer the kneeling players are perfectly within their rights if they object. Which again is true. Some might say, booing and jeering is more ‘gesture politics’. As is everything legal you’re allowed to do in a democracy. You can’t blow up parliament, you can’t assassinate the PM, even if you really want to, but you can use free speech in a non-offensive way to get a point across.

Taking the knee will not change much, that is as sure as it is fairly sad. And was proven on Sunday night within 5 seconds of the last missed penalty when our former ‘heroes’ were immediately divided by colour as the abusers took to Twitter. But it makes precisely that point. That black players are treated worse than whites. More harshly. More quickly and hurtfully criticised. Attacked for nothing. And you can attack someone for missing a penalty, if you’re a cruel, heartless absolute moron with no concept of contextual pressure, but you can’t attack a penalty taker on the grounds of his colour.

As even Priti Patel said in her horror at the abuse. But alas, she’d dug her hole. Tyrone Mings just started shovelling on the earth.

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx