Emma Hayes hits back at vile Joey Barton rant with perfect four-minute takedown
Chelsea women's boss Emma Hayes has reminded Joey Barton of the history of male privilege in football after the ex-Bristol Rovers boss' vile comments about female commentators.
Barton took aim at women on broadcasts of men's football during a series of social media posts during the week and continued to double down on his comments on TV and online. He has already received plenty of backlash from the likes of Laura Woods and Bianca Westwood, among others, and Hayes is the latest to chime in.
Hayes, who has agreed a deal to take charge of the United States Women's National team after the current WSL season, is well-versed in the history of football. She demonstrated as much in a four-minute takedown of the 41-year-old which put women's role in the sport in a wider context.
"Look, I think the broader issues that need to be addressed, I’m not going to pollute or dilute that conversation by making it about personality of individuals," Hayes told reporters ahead of her Chelsea team's game against Everton. "The realities are that male privilege has been something that’s always been at the centre of football in this country.
"Women were banned playing football up until the 1970s. I don’t expect any individual personality to understand their privilege, nonetheless you only have to see scores of women across the internet or in the business, whether you’re a presenter, a coach or a player to realise that we’re routinely used to dealing with systemic misogyny, bullying, and behaviour that has been pretty normal for a large part of the football public.
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"The realities of it is that I find the debate interesting and we should have that debate without being personal about it and I’m not referring to any individuals. But I feel that sport is the last place in society where that male privilege exists and so naturally if I go all Darwinism on us and speak evolution theory, the realities of it are that, when there is an existential threat, you either evolve or you die. It’s one or the other.
What are your thoughts about Emma Hayes' response? Have your say in the comments section
Chelsea boss Emma Hayes has responded to Joey Barton's comments (Dave Shopland/REX/Shutterstock)"I think when it comes to the sport of football in this case, we have to remember that society isn’t always as well represented across the media or across the game in coaching or playing," Hayes continued. If you haven’t experienced systemic misogyny like lots of us have, you can’t for one moment understand how detrimental some of these conversations are, knowing that anything anyone says just enables an absolute pile on, particularly on social media which, let me be clear, doesn’t take a lot for people to pile on women. It’s pretty normal for a lot of people that support football.
"So it’s sad, a little bit, not that we are having this conversation, we should have the conversation about the broader issue of it. But I want to accentuate the positive, I want to accentuate the positive contributions that many of us, myself included, have made to the game of football.
"Unlike other professions, and I have to say this because I’m always fascinated with it, rarely do we go into a hospital and if we have a female physician who is carrying out a surgical procedure on someone’s kidney, often we won’t turn around and say to that surgeon, “I hope she was a good patient once cause being a good patient means that you’re going to be a good doctor.” Well we know that’s not true.
"Talent and experience might help and a good skill set. It’s the same about being a great banker. Does that mean you had to be a frugal spender to be a good banker?
"Much in the same way, do you have to be a well-travelled passenger to be a good pilot? I think we become so unaware of our confirmation biases, but two, when there’s an existential threat, the things we do to make ourselves relevant create a lot of noise around a very, very, very interesting topic but perhaps we could do it better in another way."
Plenty of fans were full of plaudits for Hayes after her comments. "I'd rather listen to Emma Hayes than hear Joey Barton any day of the week," one wrote.
Another said: "For me...Whether she’s talking men’s or women’s football, Emma Hayes is the best in-game pundit and analyst I hear on TV. Barton’s a football nobody."
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