The example given by Joey Barton given to back up his belief that women broadcasters should not be working in the men’s game was incorrect, eagle-eyed social media users have discovered.
The former Bristol Rovers manager – who is unemployed after being sacked in October – appeared on Piers Morgan: Uncensored on Thursday evening in a bid to plead his case after posting a string of incendiary misogynist comments on X (formerly Twitter) on Wednesday.
The 41-year-old argued that men who listened to women working in the men’s game needed ‘their heads testing’, and went on to state that their sole reason for employment is because organisations have ‘quotas to fill and boxes to tick’.
In his television appearance, which saw him share views that at times appeared to drastically contradict each other, Barton was not prepared to name names of broadcasters who he felt fell short of the ‘journalistic standards’ currently not being met by female pundits and commentators, but did offer an example of where he felt a commentator had made a mistake.
Talking about the commentator during Liverpool‘s Premier League tie against Fulham, Barton claimed that she had said ‘(Wataru) Endo scored through his laces’.
Joey Barton (right) gave an incorrect example of bad commentary to support his argument that women should not be broadcasters in the men’s game on Piers Morgan: Uncensored
Barton took aim at a comment made by Courtney Sweetman-Kirk (left) – which she never said
The 41-year-old sparked the misogynistic comment-storm on Wednesday with a series of sexist posts on social media
‘He scored with the side of his foot,’ Barton asserted. ‘But no one because it was female co-comms, and female commentator called and said, “hang on a minute, that didn’t happen”.’
The ex-Manchester City player said the mistake could impact young people looking to be ‘educated’ by watching matches on television, and that if mistakes go ‘unchecked’, the standard is being pulled down because of a ‘woke agenda’.
Barton appeared to again contradict himself moments later as he admitted: ‘who hasn’t made a mistake, we all make mistakes’ – but showed no willingness to retract the statement.
But in a clip circulating on social media, Barton’s understanding of incident was proven to be a mistake in itself.
Instead of the comment Barton reported, Courtney Sweetman-Kirk – the commentator in question – had only referenced a shot played ‘through the laces’ as a point of comparison.
Sweetman-Kirk (centre) previously played for Liverpool’s women’s side betwen 2018 and 2020
The former Bristol Rovers manager appeared to contradict himself throughout his appearance
‘How many players do you see at the moment panic, put their laces through it, smash it over the bar’ Sweetman-Kirk wonders aloud over replayed footage of the Japanese midfielder’s shot.
‘But no – Endo just strokes it into that top right-hand corner. What else has this game got left?’
After his controversial appearance on TalkTV, which was widely pilloried on social media, Barton was in no mood to drop his argument, and continued keep the discussion going.
The ex-QPR player branded popular broadcasters Laura Woods and Bianca Westwood ‘not brave enough’ to ‘debate him’ after he announced that he was planning ‘2 hours of raw debate. Unedited.’ – despite Westwood making an assertive appearance challenging his viewpoint on the programme the night before.
He later shared a series of posts which suggested there was a ‘danger’ in ‘hiring women in the men’s game’, extending the argument to ‘certain roles in certain departments’ rather than just limiting the ban to broadcasting.
BBC Sport pundit Alex Scott fired back at criticism from the ex-player, prior to an interview, where she joked with a friend that they would ‘talk about’ Barton
Barton targeted Scott specificially as he argued that her lack of playing experience in the men’s game would deem her unqualified for punditry
But one of the targets of his ranting, BBC’s Alex Scott, appeared unconcerned, and unwilling to wade into his self-created firestorm.
On her Instagram Story, Scott appeared to poke fun at Barton’s increasing fury in a video that saw he joking with a comment about an upcoming interview.
In the video, Scott (behind the camera) asks her colleague: ‘Who are you interviewing today?’
The man in the video joked: ‘It might be you actually’ before Scott chimed in and asked: ‘What we gonna talk about, Joey Barton?’ before bursting into hysterics.
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