169QPR. Someone called my name – my full name – so I
thought, “Oh, they probably know me.” At this point
people were starting to recognise me a bit. He says, “Can
I speak to you for a second?” I said, “Yeah, no problem.”
So I walk across the road and then he says the n-word
and he head-butts me. And I was scratching my head
thinking, “Did he just do this?” And then I took care of
the rest.You took care of the rest?
Yeah. I took care of the rest.What’s really interesting about what you’ve done is that
you’ve called out the media and normally people who really
call out the media end up getting done over even worse by
the media. But you seem to be getting a better press, in part
because you’ve called them out.
I wasn’t trying to say, “You lot are this, you lot are that.”
I was just trying to put a point across just to do better in
newspapers... It was more, “Just open your eyes and give
people a fair chance.” It wasn’t having a go; it was more
trying to do it in a way that was calm. And people got
the message.Who did you talk to before you did it?
No one. I just said to myself this is something I feel I
need to do.If you’d have thought it was going to go as big as it did,
would you have discussed it with somebody else?
To be fair, when I finished writing it I gave it to
[Fabian] Delph and then I gave it to Vinny [recently
departed club captain Vincent Kompany] to check
it a little bit.Are they the brains of the squad?
They are two people I love and respect who tell
me exactly how it is and they’re honest with
me. They both loved it and from their reaction I
thought, “Yeah, cool.”“THE WORDING,
THE SUBTLE
MESSAGES
NEWSPAPERS
USE, HAVE HAD A
MASSIVE EFFECT
ON HOW PEOPLE
PERCEIVE YOUNG
BL ACK PL AYERS”
JACKET, JOGGERS,
UNDERWEAR; ALL
BY TOM FORD.
SNEAKERS BY LOUIS
VUITTON. NECK
CHAIN, WATCH,
RINGS; ALL BY
AVIANNE & CO.