Tony Dallas

Published: 6 March 2014

IT’S an unfortunate fact of life that nobody wants to talk about the elephant in the room. As the Terry Kettering poem says: “There’s an elephant in the room. It is large and squatting, so it is hard to get around it. Yet we squeeze by with, ‘How are you?’ and ‘I’m fine,’ and a thousand other forms of trivial chatter.”

So when Sol Campbell says he believes if he were white he would have been England captain for at least 10 years, the elephant begins to stir. Some have argued that Campbell is simply trying to be controversial so that he can sell copies of his book – which might well be true. Maybe he’s forgotten he was England captain – just like Paul Ince and Rio Ferdinand.

But nevertheless, institutional racism is still a subject that most elephant-keepers don’t want to talk about. Most don’t want to discuss the subject because it opens not just a can but whole vat of worms.

Some are comfortable in their positions and ideologies of what fair representation means, so won’t change the way things have always been. Others, like Sol Campbell, find it easier to discuss situations that are controversial once out of the lime­light – which is understandable. How many white-owned clubs would want to employ a black player who was running around the league saying the “powers-that-be” are racist?

Because of my affiliation with Spurs I have no particular reason to listen to anything turncoat Campbell says. But you can’t run away from the truth. And though I don’t believe any player should have the captain’s armband for too long, when he was playing for Spurs, he should have at least had it for a while.

It’s strange, because as a black man born in this country, I still wonder whether we’ll ever have a black James Bond? Or a black Father Christmas?

I remember being happy the first time I saw a black man on a Gillette razor advert and then on a car advert after the “powers-that-be” finally realised that not only did black people shave, they drove cars as well.

These thoughts are alien to many of the indigenous population – it’s the elephant in the room, and discus­sing it, even with friends, might just be awk­ward! Football is global, it should seek to reflect in its makeup aspects of the society it purports to represent. Ethnic minorities are not being given the head jobs. Not only in foot­ball, but in cricket, rugby, tennis, athletics, and the rest. So let’s get Jumbo out of the way, shall we.  

TONY DALLAS

• Is sport  still institutionally racist, and if so, how can society get rid of the elephant in the room? Have your say at sports@camdennewjournal.com