06 January 2024 , 13:10
389
0
Joey Barton has escalated his war of words with Gary Neville by insinuating the former Manchester United defender is a coward.
Barton has been desperately seeking attention on social media in an effort to rebrand himself since being sacked by Bristol Rovers in October. He has begun a bizarre crusade against female pundits and commentators, which took a vile turn on Friday when he compared Eni Aluko and Lucy Ward to notorious serial killers Fred and Rose West.
That prompted Aluko and Ward’s employers, ITV, to release a statement condemning the former Manchester City midfielder’s comments. Neville then became a target for Barton after offering his own thoughts on his misogynistic and utterly unhinged diatribe. The unemployed 41-year-old responded to Neville by tweeting: “Keep your nut down you little wet wipe. If you so much as utter my name in vain again, the floodgates will open on you.”
In a reply, one of Barton’s followers asked if Neville was a “man or a mouse”. Barton wrote back: “He’s a mouse. Just look at the tunnel incident at Highbury. He s*** his little pants. Big Patrick absolutely violated him. Until Keano saved his bacon.”
Barton was referring to a famous incident in the tunnel before a game between Arsenal and Manchester United in February 2005 when Patrick Vieira clashed with Roy Keane. The United captain later explained that he felt Vieira had been “bullying” Neville before kick-off, prompting him to step in and fire some choice words back.
Football ownership set for huge shake-up that will impact multi-million buyers
Barton was criticised for his comments by Neville and ITV (James Marsh/REX/Shutterstock)Neville did not seem to be offended by Barton’s comments on Twitter, simply responding with three laughing face emojis. The pundit clearly has the upper ground after ITV called out Barton.
ITV wrote: “For Joey Barton, an ex-professional player with a significant social media presence, to target two of our pundits, Eni Aluko and Lucy Ward, with such vindictive remarks based on gender and to invoke the names of serial killers in doing so is clearly contemptible and shameful on his part. Football is for everyone."
Neville praised ITV for their words (Paul Greenwood/REX/Shutterstock)Neville then tweeted: “Well done ITV. It’s gone too far this and mentioning serial killers is quite simply incredible. My daughters have watched Salford City with me for 10 years and like to comment on football, my mum was kicked out of the football team (boys in the 1960’s) and stopped playing due to misogyny, my sister struggled for funding for her sport for years and my brother was mocked when he took over the England women’s team.
“I come from a family that has fought these issues for years and I’ve witnessed it first hand. All this does is just discourage and it’s not the way forward. It’s bloody hard work for Women to succeed in sport and media as it is without this stuff.” Barton replied: “Gary, please keep your head down or you will get emptied as well. I know they pay your wages and I don’t want to have to put you away. Worry about one of the other 3758 business things you’ve got going on. I’ll decide when it’s gone too far. Not you.”