An open letter to Thierry Henry

 
s. portsfan Roar Rookie

By s. portsfan, 22 Nov 2009 s. portsfan is a Roar Rookie

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Dear Thierry, I’m terribly sorry I had to do this through a letter, this is not easy for me at all, honestly. The way you behaved the other night has pushed me past a point of no return. Why did you do what you did?

I know that sometimes things happen in the heat of the moment. Mistakes are made. That tiny fraction of a second of error in judgement is going to cost you immeasurably.

If you had spoken up straight away and apologized I could have forgiven you. If you had taken the immediate opportunity to admit your fault we could have got past this. But that opportunity ended when I saw you hugging/kissing William Gallas. To wait until the end of the evening to own up was gutless and you have lost my respect. What is the good of admitting your responsibility when it is too late to take it back?

But that’s life; sometimes it isn’t fair – I’ll get over it.

I guess it’s been a slow, naive realization on my part that something like this was bound to happen sooner or later. You work in a “win at all costs” culture. Sport is not sport anymore, it’s merely entertainment; something to fill the gaps between the advertisements. The players are brands and have a responsibility to their sponsors – I’d love to see them publicly chastise you.

Over the past few years you and your mates have been getting too big for your expensive-to-buy, mass-sweatshop-produced boots. Who pays you this money? Well I do, or at least some of it is mine. So, from now on I choose not to. I will not go see you play, or buy the products you promote, or buy your latest team shirt with your name on the back. I choose not to buy the magazines with articles about you. I can surf in the other direction on the internet. My kids will not wear your brand of boots.

At the end of the day, it’s our money that you live off – the spectators and fans. Maybe I’ll stop spending money on the sports that allow this sort of behavior to continue. Maybe it’ll just be me, maybe others will do the same. Maybe, and this is a massive maybe, the controlling bodies of sports will start to see enough of a shift in public opinion that will compel them to enforce their games’ participants to play fair.

Yes, you create glorious viewing entertainment, but what about spirit of the game? Professional sport has become so full of ungentlemanly conduct, diving, feigning injury, harassing the officials that we as spectators have become numb to it.

I applaud cricketers who walk when they know they have nicked the ball. I have the utmost respect for the player who accepts an officials’ decision even if they disagree. I marvel at the gutsy player who stays on their feet battling for the ball when it would be easier to hit the turf and appeal for a free kick.

I am in favour of video evidence being used after a match, and believe it would help penalize those that choose to cheat. Players caught can be heavily fined and serve bans. Show the next generation what is expected of them. Just as a player is lauded for making the choice to step one way, before timing his connection with the ball to guide it into the net, so to a player makes a conscious choice to cheat or stray outside the spirit of the game.

So in summary, there’s nothing you can do to change my mind. I can’t change your attitude, and have finally given up. Life is too short. All I can do is change myself. I hope our paths don’t cross. It’s best we make a clean break, so please don’t try to contact me at all.

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