I used to quite like Andy Gray. His enthusiasm for tactical analysis was infectious and his book Flat Back Four, observing defensive shapes and largely rubbishing sweeper systems at a time when they were quite popular (very few top clubs deploy them now), was a good read. However, he's turned into an arrogant tosser in recent times, and on two occasions this season has been overheard making ridiculously opionated comments 'off air'. A few months ago he called Arsenal's Theo Walcott "useless", and, more controversially, last weekend mocked the appointment of Sian Massey, a female assistant referee, for the Premier League clash between Wolves and Liverpool. Gray was about to cover the game in his usual role of co-commentator.
To be fair to Gray (in the loosest possible sense), it was Sky Sports' studio anchorman Richard Keys who provoked the issue and was probably the bigger culprit.
"Somebody had better go down and explain offside to her," Keys quipped in the pre-match build-up.
"Women don't understand the offside rule," Gray replied.
"Of course they don't. I guarantee you there will be a big one [crucial offside decision] today," said Keys.
Neither knew their microphones were switched on.
Well, Keys was right. And guess what, Massey got it spot on. It was a massively crucial call because it led to Liverpool taking the lead.
Raul Meireles was sent clear and Fernando Torres scored from his cross but despite Wolves players protesting that Meireles was offside, TV replays revealed that he was level with Wolves' last defender, Ronald Zubar, and was therefore onside when the ball was played.
Women are often mocked for not knowing the offside rule but that's hardly surprising when - forgive the generalisation - a large percentage have little interest in the game as a whole. Actually, my other half and I have a running joke that if she can't sleep she'll ask me to explain the offside rule to her. Trust me, within seconds she's gone. But the point is, not knowing the offside rule isn't a gender issue, it's simply knowledge or interest-based. How many men who don't like football can genuinely claim they know how the rule works?
Apologies for what may be a dubious comparison but what happened to Massey actually reminded me of an incident about 10 years ago when I played for Bugbrooke St Michaels, a local Saturday league team based on the outskirts of Northampton. We were about to take on a team from Rushden when our manager noticed something.
"Lads, their team has three Asians. Everybody knows Asians can't play football so get stuck into them, they won't like it," he hissed.
We went on to win the game 3-2 but one of those Asians scored both of their goals. This may have happened a decade ago but even then the Kick Racism Out of Football campaign was in full swing and largely a success.
Comparing race and gender discrimination is a somewhat sensitive issue, particularly as I'm neither a woman nor an ethnic minority, but there are certainly alarming similarities in terms of the representation issue. Without wanting to go all A Level Sociology on you, those who are under-represented in the workplace face the double burden of climbing up the ladder in the first place and then having to work extra hard when they get there to justify their promotion in a world where suspiciousness over quota issues and tokenism dominate.
It took a long time for black footballers in British football to be accepted and respected. Even when black players started to hurdle racism and came into prominence during the mid to late 80s there were still doubts as to whether they had 'the bottle' to cope when winter kicked in and teams had to battle on muddy and icy pitches. Obviously such accusations have been comprehensively quashed since. Black players are now strongly represented in the game and have become heroes and role models to fans all over the world. However, it's taken more than a generation to make it happen and now female officials face a similarly uphill task.
What makes Gray and Keys's comments even sadder is: a) it wasn't even Massey's first Premier League game (her debut was a month ago when Sunderland played Blackpool); and b) she isn't the first female official by a long shot. As far back as 1991 (ironically the same year Sky started covering live football), Wendy Toms was appointed as a fourth official for a third division match between Bournemouth and Reading, and after a stint refereeing in the Football League Conference she became a Premier League referee's assistant in 1996.
Not that she escaped prejudice, of course. In 1999, Gordon Strachan, then managing Coventry, was livid with her performance after his team were beaten 4-3 by Leeds following a controversial offside call in Leeds' favour.
"We are getting PC decisions about promoting ladies. It does not matter if they are ladies, men or Alsatian dogs. If they are not good enough to run the line they should not get the job. Saturday's was the worst assistant refereeing decision I have seen this season by far and I've said that in my report. The fourth Leeds goal was offside by at least four yards and there were numerous other bad decisions in the game. My message is don't be politically correct and promote people just for the sake of it," he fumed.
Four years ago, another female official in Amy Rayner suffered even worse abuse. Commenting on her performance as a referee's assistant after his Luton team were beaten 3-2 by QPR, manager Mike Newell said: "She shouldn't be here. I know that sounds sexist but I am sexist. This is not park football, so what are women doing here?".
Unfortunately, unless a significant number of female referees break through into the big leagues soon, officials like Massey are going to suffer comments like these, and no doubt even worse ones from fans, for many years to come due to being so under-represented in the men's game.
However, ending on a more upbeat and somewhat chaotic note, since I started this blog 24 hours ago Gray has been sacked by Sky. It's a brave decision considering he and Keys have fronted Sky's football coverage right from the start 20 years ago. But perhaps this whole incident epitomises the generation gap. Back then email, internet and mobile phones didn't exist and Status Quo were still being played on Radio 1. Life has moved on significantly since but attitudes don't necessarily follow suit.
At the time of writing nothing has been decided on Keys's future. He should really go as well for his part in the furore. He has apologised to Massey but does that really mean anything? Like a schoolchild given detention for copying a classmate's spelling test, isn't he just sorry because he got caught?
Besides, how someone with as little charisma as Keys has lasted this long fronting live football coverage is anyone's guess. As far as I'm concerned that's as good a reason as any to confine him to the scrapheap.
I wonder what Gray's wife makes of all this. Maybe she's slaving away over dinner in the kitchen while he sits in the dining room masturbating over whether to position the pepper pot behind the salt and Ketchup or deploy it wider to sit in front of the bottle of wine.
Never mind, Andy, I'm sure you'll get a call from ITV soon...
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