Sky Suspend Keys And Gray But Was It Enough?

Tuesday, 25th January 2011 at 09:06am

Following the fallout about the chauvinistic comments made by Sky Sports presenters Richard Keys and Andy Gray, both men were suspended for Sky's Monday Night Football program.

The incident in question came when the duo - part of Sky's football coverage since the beginning of the Premier League in 1992 - were caught of air making sexist remarks towards Sian Massey, assistant referee for the Wolverhampton Wanderers v Liverpool match at Molineux on Saturday, January 22.

During the match, Massey, running the line for the second time in the Premier League, made an excellent decision to allow play to continue when Liverpool midfielder Raul Meireles ran onto a through ball from Christian Poulsen.

At first glance Meireles appeared to be offside but TV replays proved that Massey had made the correct decision.

Her performance in the game has drawn praise from all corners but the disparaging comments from Keys and Gray were made before the game had begun with Keys also belittling West Ham United director Karen Brady who had earlier written a column about the barriers facing women in football.

The duo were recorded by Sky microphones saying:

Keys: Somebody better get down there and explain offside to her.

Gray: Can you believe that? A female linesman. Women don't know the offside rule.

Keys: Course they don't. I can guarantee you there will be a big one today. Kenny will go potty. [pause] This is not the first time, is it? Didn't we have one before?

Gray: Wendy Toms, yeah.

Keys: The game's gone mad. Did you hear charming Karen Brady this morning complaining about sexism? Yeah, do me a favour, love.

Barney Francis, the managing director of Sky Sports, warned the pair about their future conduct before suspending the pair of them from Monday night's broadcast.

Keys has subsequently contacted Massey and apologised, something she has accepted, but was their suspension punishment enough?

In April 2004, Ron Atkinson, a pundit for ITV and a columnist for the Guardian newspaper, referred to Marcel Desailly as "a fucking lazy, thick nigger" believing his microphone to be off.

Although not broadcasting to British TV, the feed was still live in the Middle East and the uproar Atkinson's comment provoked prompted ITV chief Brian Barwick to demand his resignation. Atkinson also then left his position at the Guardian by mutual consent.

ITV set a precedent and now Sky should follow their lead, even if it means losing two of their stalwarts. By allowing them to keep their highly paid jobs, it spreads the message that sexism, while frowned upon, isn't as bad as racism.

I have little doubt that the suspension won't cause the pair to radically alter their thoughts on the presence of women in the game; all that will happen is that they will keep their prejudice to themselves in future.

It could be argued that sacking them wouldn't change their beliefs either but at least it would make the right statement of intent: sexism has no place in football.

Discrimination of any form has no place in sport and society as a whole; it should be up to institutions like Sky, ITV and the BBC to uphold and promote such values.

The FA, regardless of its other faults of which it has many, has worked extremely hard to try and eliminate racism from the game of football and should be commended for its efforts to encourage female referees and assistants into the game.

It now needs the rest of the game to follow suit. Sky sacking Keys and Gray would be a good way to start.

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