“I’ve no idea why you are sending me this. Perhaps you could enlighten me?”
It’s not the response that would ordinarily be expected from the leader of an organisation that purports to take the fight against racism seriously and had just been sent a six-page document claiming that a cover-up involving a racial allegation had taken place within his own structure.
Greg Clarke, chairman of the Football Association, is certainly facing some tough and harrowing questions about his suitability to run the governing body bearing in mind that was the 14-word reply – curt, dismissive, almost implausible – he emailed to the Professional Footballers’ Association after they told him that they thought there had been a whitewash to “close down” the complaint against Mark Sampson and get him off the hook.
Yet it seems even more extraordinary that it came in response to the first piece of information Clarke would have received that Eni Aluko, the player the FA once championed as an “England icon”, claimed Sampson had made a “racist joke” to her about Ebola and her family, later revealed to be him allegedly telling her to be careful her Nigerian relatives did not bring the virus to Wembley. Sampson vehemently denies making any racial remarks.
Did Clarke care about the new allegations? Was he not disturbed, to say the least, to hear what was being said against a key employee? And how does Clarke justify his position when he appeared to be so astounded that the PFA considered the alleged cover-up serious enough to go to the top of the FA?
It certainly isn’t easy to understand why Clarke should be the one seeking an explanation when the PFA had written to him to allege that the FA’s technical director, Dan Ashworth, and director of human resources, Rachel Brace, had overseen a “sham” inquiry to clear Sampson of the allegation that the now-deposed England Women’s manager had asked Drew Spence, a mixed-raced player, how many times she had been arrested.
The PFA had also alleged that Aluko was dropped, ostracised and found her 11-year, 102-cap England career being ended for “unLioness behaviour”, a term that has still not been explained properly, within two weeks of agreeing to discuss her experiences in what she was told was a confidential process.
Yet Clarke apparently seemed bemused to think the alleged sabotaging of a player’s international career was any of his business and again when the PFA described the FA’s internal review as “not a genuine search for the truth”. There was, Clarke was told, “incontrovertible evidence that makes it clear the purported investigation was a sham”. It was a “failure to conduct even the most basic investigation”. Over six pages, this evidence was set out, identifying the FA employees who were allegedly responsible. Yet Clarke seems perplexed, irritated even, to receive the email.
Was he not alarmed by what he was hearing? Did he not think he should come up with something better than oafishly complaining he had “no idea” why the PFA thought it was his business?
Evidently not – and it is tempting to think the FA might have acted very differently if the allegations involved the England men’s team. You might remember the time Roy Hodgson, at half-time of one match, tried to spin the old Nasa space monkey joke and instructed his players to “feed the monkey”, meaning Andros Townsend. The previous FA regime had contacted every single England player within 24 hours of the story coming out.
As for the FA’s response to this latest self-inflicted wound, the statement released by the governing body ignores the fact Clarke had just been informed about new allegations – not least the claim that one member of Sampson’s backroom staff used to address Aluko with a fake Caribbean accent – even before taking into account the seriousness of the accusations facing two of his senior executives.
“Once Greg Clarke had received the letter he checked with his executive team as to what actions were being taken regarding the allegations,” the FA’s statement reads, referring to the issue involving Spence. “At this point there had been an internal inquiry and Katharine Newton was about to be appointed to lead an independent second inquiry. He was therefore satisfied that the FA was taking the matter very seriously and acting appropriately.”
Yet that still leaves a number of unanswered questions for Clarke about his judgment and he should not expect an easy ride when he appears before the digital, culture, media and sport select committee on Wednesday. Kick It Out and the other anti-racism groups might also want a full explanation. Indeed, Clarke could conceivably face questions about whether his appearance in front of the MPs ought to be his final act in the job.
His email is certainly a lot different to his interview with the Daily Telegraph two weeks ago when he talked heroically about his determination to get the truth and praised Aluko – whose dignity in this case puts the FA to shame – for reporting her complaints.
One of the people involved in the process has described the FA as “built on spin” and it is difficult to have even a scrap of trust when the organisation, prior to sacking Sampson for whatever he got up to at Bristol Academy in his previous coaching role, cleared him of making the Spence comment yet never asked her to give evidence (the FA later claimed, risibly, it did not know the player’s identity).
The killer detail was all included in the correspondence that Clarke received from the PFA last November. Judging by his response Clarke seemed to think it was beneath him. Ashworth and Brace, Clarke would have learned, reached their findings without speaking to key witnesses and without watching a video recording of the relevant meeting. Or how about the story of Ashworth not replying for two months to the email where Aluko gave her version of events? Ashworth later claimed that it must have got lost in cyberspace – an explanation, according to the PFA, that “lacks credibility and is not accepted as being genuine”. Yet Clarke, again, did not appear to see it as his business.
In another organisation it would have left Ashworth and Brace as the subject of an investigation. Not the FA, though. Clarke just seems bewildered that the PFA have hassled him with it. “Perhaps you could enlighten me?” he asks, and you have to wonder whether he and Ashworth, two of the more influential men in English football, need their heads knocking together.
