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“Without [piety], we will never select any player, regardless of his potential. I always strive to make sure that those who wear the Egypt jersey are on good terms with God,” said Hassan Shehata, coach of the Egyptian national football team, who have just beaten Ghana in the final of the Africa Cup of Nations. It appears that this is why the hard-partying, Miss-Belgium-dating Middlesbrough striker Mido was dismissed from the squad: he wasn’t godly enough.
Secular commentators have sniggered predictably at this policy, thinking it absurd that “in this day and age” any sniff of morality or religiosity ought to find its way into football. Heaven forbid.
But they have also to examine the allegations about the Chelsea defender and England captain John Terry. Let me admit a bias here: I am a Chelsea fan. Although I have blushed at the provenance of those roubles that keep my team at the top, it has not stopped me supporting them. But the Terry situation is different. John Terry (who is married with children) has reportedly had an affair with the partner of his best mate and fellow England defender, Wayne Bridge, even allegedly procuring for her an abortion when he got her pregnant. How low can you get?
How can the trust that is essential between defenders be maintained, if one of them is nipping round in the afternoon to play with the other’s partner? It doesn’t say much for whatever “best mates” is supposed to mean — or for any concern for spouses and the children of both couples. Hassan Shehata for England manager, I say.
When the Egyptians score a goal, they prostrate themselves, placing their faces on the ground in an act of gratitude to God. The equivalent celebrations from English players now seem to take place in “exclusive” nightclubs and seedy hotel suites, where silly young girls are persuaded to get their kit off for bottles of ludicrously expensive champagne. Nothing seems too undignified in the mucky world of English football.
The problem is that people like John Terry think that they are gods. No wonder, when they make £170,000 a week in wages, and many thousands more on top of that in sponsorships. They are lauded as heroes, when all they can really do is kick a ball about a field.
The problem with people who think they are gods is that they fly too close to the sun, get burned, and then plummet to earth. On the other hand, the Egyptian players, in abasing themselves on the field, are making a public show that they do not think of themselves in this way. Here is some much-needed humility in the preposterously hubristic world of football.
The Revd Dr Giles Fraser is Canon Chancellor of St Paul’s Cathedral and Director of the St Paul’s Institute.
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