Harry Maguire: Fallout from Manchester United star’s Greek arrest reveals society’s warped view of footballers

Sport is a simple concept complicated by people. The late Al Davis, who was owner of the Oakland Raiders, understood that and boiled its essence down to winning and losing. The Raiders played the Philadelphia Eagles in Super Bowl XV in New Orleans in 1981. They had a troubled week in the Big Easy. Cliff Branch, the wide receiver, missed the team flight from California and a number of players were involved in various early-hours scuffles on Bourbon Street.

Come gameday, the Raiders stormed to a 27-10 victory with Branch catching two touchdowns. Davis was asked afterwards by reporters whether he was going to discipline the receiver or any of the French Quarter miscreants. “What the f**k’s the difference?” Davis asked, aghast. The controversy was dead.

Harry Maguire is still mired in controversy. The Manchester United captain is sitting at home while England prepare for their Nations Cup match against Iceland on Saturday after being selected and then withdrawn from the squad by Gareth Southgate in the wake of the centre-back’s arrest at a holiday resort in Greece. The FA’s reactive approach has not made the situation any better. England backed their man with a call-up, stood him down when he was convicted and were left with nowhere to go when Maguire was granted a fresh trial after an appeal. The incident in Mykonos has turned into an all-round embarrassment. Even Wayne Rooney has weighed in to criticise the treatment of the player.

The sideshows to the arrest have been more instructive than the frankly minor fracas on the holiday island. There have been eye-opening public statements on both sides. At a time when Maguire and his fellow professionals are taking a pre-match knee in support of Black Lives Matter, hearing the 27-year-old say he feared for his life at the hands of undercover police feels like a public-relations miscalculation. The claim from the arresting officers that Maguire was shouting “f**k the Greek civilisation” is risible.

United have handled things well. Allowing the player to continue wearing the armband after an internal slap on the wrist is enough given the circumstances. The FA got it wrong and fed an underlying resentment towards footballers that exists in sections of British society. Much of this is class based and has deep roots. There is a downside to being ‘the people’s game’.

Arthur Hopcraft’s classic book The Football Man charts the development of the sport and how it reflected the social and political status of fans and players. “Football was not so much an opiate of the people as a flag run up against the gaffer bolting his gates and the landlord armed with his bailiffs,” Hopcraft wrote. Deep within the nation’s folk memory the game still triggers images of that class divide.

There are some for whom Maguire’s travails confirm all their biases. Players are overpaid oiks, undeserving of their massive salaries and whose physicality is animalistic. Think this is an exaggeration? In April, with the pandemic reaching crisis point, Matt Hancock, the health secretary, put the spotlight on players. “Given the sacrifices that many people are making, including some of my colleagues in the NHS who have made the ultimate sacrifice,” Hancock said, “I think the first thing that Premier League footballers can do is make a contribution, take a pay cut and play their part.”

Hancock, a child of privilege whose journey to government went through a private school and both Oxbridge universities, knew which buttons to push. Presumably he knows a little about excess – after all, his boss and fellow Oxford alumnus Boris Johnson was famously a member of the riotously destructive Bullingdon Club – but rather than the squanders of inherited wealth or City fat cats, Hancock’s first thought was to target footballers.

The ‘enemy within’ is a notorious Conservative catchphrase and the FA has not helped matters. The ruling body is forever philosophically on the side of Hopcraft’s gaffers, landlords and bailiffs. The organisation’s refusal to accept responsibility for its role in the Hillsborough disaster confirms that impression. The decision on Maguire sent out the sort of message that would have Hancock and his ilk nodding their head.

The growth of wages has been used as a lever to divide those who play the game from their traditional audience. The salacious reporting of the bills run up by Maguire and his party did little to illuminate events around the arrest but cemented the impression that this was a man out of control. The excesses of famous actors, pop stars and captains of industry are rarely detailed with such disapproval.

Maguire did not get the full treatment, either. He is white. Black players do not need to have run-ins with the law to be wealth-shamed in public. When race is overlaid onto the class-inspired resentments, attitudes are even more toxic. Raheem Sterling bought a house for his mother and the property was described by a newspaper as “blinging… complete with jewel encrusted bathroom.” Dogwhistle racism follows Sterling and his black colleagues around. Many white people are deaf to the sound but minorities hear the foul and dangerous whine on a daily basis.

Maguire was one of the Premier League captains who helped organise Jordan Henderson’s initiative to create a fund of donations for the NHS during the Coronavirus emergency. He can spend his money any way he likes. That should not absolve him in the event of bad behaviour or criminal activity, but even the player’s worst enemy would struggle to depict events in Greece as more than a storm in an Ouzo glass.

The common perception is that enormous wealth has created a chasm between English footballers and the communities that nurtured them. The madness of ideas like this is that sports are among the rare professions where family connections, inherited wealth and expensive schooling offer little advantage in the handicap of life. Those who reach the highest levels in football do so because of ability and work ethic. No one can bluster or network their way to the top.

Marcus Rashford is living proof that the link between people and players has not been severed. The United forward has emerged as one of the most significant campaigners against child hunger and poverty during the pandemic. Rashford’s contribution to public life has been exceptional but he is by no means an exception in the world of football. Most players are involved in charitable initiatives in an attempt to make life better for those facing the most difficult challenges in their daily existence. At the age of 22, Rashford has shown the sort of leadership, compassion, intellect and clear-sighted positive action that shames even those at the highest echelons of British politics. What was the Prime Minister doing at Rashford’s age? He was prancing around Oxford in the costume of the Bullingdon, who are notorious for burning £50 notes in front of the homeless. Even if Johnson did not participate in such callous acts, it is doubtful he gave a second thought to hungry children during his days as part of the exclusive dining society.

So what the f**k is the difference? English football is riddled with preconceptions about class in a way Americans like Davis would not recognise. The FA’s default mode is to be part of the establishment. The Maguire case is merely a Greek comedy but it shows the archaic mores that are riddled through British culture. In a grown up society the United captain would be with the national team instead of being the latest example of how much football is part of the national angst.