Joey Barton: Gay soccer stars fear the manager - Footie ace on why homosexual players will not come out
Posted Thursday, January 19, 2012 by The Sun
SOCCER bad boy Joey Barton has blamed football bosses for preventing any professional players coming out as gay.
The outspoken QPR midfielder told a TV documentary: "Certain managers will discriminate.
"These archaic figures think if they had a gay footballer there would be all kinds of shenanigans in the dressing room."
And publicist Max Clifford said he has known half a dozen players too scared to come out.
He added: "When they have come to me to protect their identity, they have made it very clear that their career would be finished if they were known to be gay."
Not one pro footballer out of 5,000 in Britain is openly homosexual.
The BBC3 film about sexuality in sport — to be shown on January 30 — is presented by the niece of gay striker Justin Fashanu, who hanged himself in 1998.
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