BIANCA Westwood has blasted Joey Barton for his sexist comments about female football commentators.
Former footballer Barton went into a tirade on Twitter yesterday, claiming women are not qualified to talk about the men’s game.
His tirade included saying that women commentating on men’s football was the same as him “talking about knitting or netball” – and called those who disagreed with him “eunuchs” and “fart parcels”
Barton, 41, tonight defended his comments on Piers Morgan Uncensored on TalkTV.
However, he was then slammed by Bianca Westwood.
She said: “Who is qualified to speak on football then? I’ve been watching football for 40 years, my first game at West Ham was before Joey was even born.
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“I’ve been watching hours and hours of football. I worked behind the scenes at Sky for 10 years before I was even given a shot on camera, watching my male colleagues who maybe weren’t as good as I was, getting chances I was never given.
“I don’t really understand what we need to know, how long we need to work behind the scenes before we are allowed on camera. To be a pundit, the laws are the same. Emma Hayes and Sarina Wiegman can both read the game, are you saying they can’t offer an insight?
“Sounds like to me that Joey has a problem with particular pundits who haven’t done enough in the game, but how does he know? And how do we quantify that? There’s EFL players who are commentating, co-commentating on Champions League games. So what level – as far as Joey Barton is concerned – do you have to get before you can be an expert on the ‘men’s game’?”
Barton replied: “I take everything on board. I’ve known Bianca, being around the game for as long as she has and she works very hard and does a fantastic job.
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“I wouldn’t say Bianca is there on tokenism, she’s worked incredibly hard and has earned that recognition within the industry.”
The controversial star’s comments have received a huge backlash after the former Bristol Rovers boss said he does not think women pundits should be allowed to comment on the men’s game.
Barton’s tweeted: “Women shouldn’t be talking with any kind of authority in the men’s game. Come on. Let’s be serious.
“It’s a completely different game. If you don’t accept that. We will always see things differently.
“The women’s game is thriving. Fantastic to see.
“I cannot take a thing they say serious in the men’s arena.”
Hours after his initial tirade Barton doubled down on his comments and called out Manchester City‘s social media manager.
Barton also responded to several men taking issue with his comments by calling them “eunuchs”.
He also posted images of children’s dolls such as Action Man without any genitalia to emphasis his point.
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TNT Sports presenter Woods leaped to the Man City media manager’s defence after Barton stated his desire to rid football of influencers.
Woods tweeted: “Usually avoid these conversations as I don’t like adding more oxygen. But throwing young vloggers to the wolves is wrong.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
