Ligue 1’s LGBTQ+ campaign washed out by absent players and tone-deaf managers

“It’s catastrophic,” bemoaned the Brest manager, Eric Roy, after his team’s slender win over Auxerre. “It’s very good that the league is getting involved, but I think it needs to deal with football first of all.” The former midfielder was criticising the timing of last weekend’s anti-homophobia campaign in France’s top two divisions, which involved managers and captains wearing rainbow-coloured armbands and the numbers on the back of players’ shirts featuring the same motif. “We’re clearly seeing that it’s causing a problem for some players. Everyone has their opinions; personally it’s not a problem for me.”

“Don’t do it in the final four games, when clubs’ survival is at stake,” Roy went on, ostensibly unaware that last week’s matchday was chosen because 17 May is International Day against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia. Evidently, the founders should have taken the ramifications on future Ligue 1 relegation battles into consideration before choosing that day – marking the World Health Organization’s decision to declassify homosexuality as a mental disorder – to draw attention to violence and discrimination experienced by LGBTQ+ people.

Specifically, Roy was frustrated that his team’s relegation battle rivals Nantes were able to face a Toulouse side who were without a group of players. His remarks, somewhat puzzling given his team had gone five points clear of the drop zone with three games to go, were echoed by the club director Grégory Lorenzi: “When you want to do these kinds of things, don’t do it when there are key games, it can distort things.”

The Rennes manager, Bruno Génésio, also expressed doubts about the campaign: “We’re against all forms of discrimination, but I’m not sure it’s necessary to have a