We’ve seen a lot of emotionally charged posts from Marcus Rashford in the last 12-18 months. But this most recent feels like it hits a bit harder.
After missing a penalty in the final of the European Championship, sadly, Marcus was among a group of England players who received swarms of abuse online. This abuse was racially motivated.
It’s a sad indictment on society that most people saw this coming. After the three players who missed the penalties were Sancho, Rashford and Saka. Three young black men were now an easy scapegoat for England’s dream not quite coming to fruition. The amount of abuse that was directed at these players, particularly Saka who is only 19, is sickening. The way that some people can just turn and target someone else like that is disgusting.
In his most recent post Marcus openly spoke about having a ‘difficult season’ and that he might have gone into the final ‘with a lack of confidence’. As a Man United fan, it’s pretty easy to love Marcus Rashford. But this kind of thing makes him that much more relatable and likeable. He really does seem like any of us, a childhood United fan living the dream, who has unreal amounts of pressure put on him by the media and fans to some extent.
What makes this whole situation more sickening is that we had people questioning the validity of his charity work off the field. Even describing his achievements as charity work feels like a disservice, the man has changed government policy. He helped feed some of the most vulnerable children in this country and people want to question whether he should have been practicing penalties rather than doing that. Let’s not forget that Marcus Rashford is probably the second-best penalty taker in that England squad behind Harry Kane. Marcus is not someone who shies away from high-pressure situations. In fact, he usually thrives on them. This was just a mistake. Something that anyone can make.
The fact that Marcus feels the need to post something like this is heart-breaking. How he feels he needs to apologise for getting one of his few involvements in the tournament wrong. Again this is testament to how twisted football fans can be.
The way that Marcus handles situations like this is frankly inspirational. There is one line in his post that really stands out: “I can take critique of my performance all day long, my penalty was not good enough, it should have gone in, but I will never apologise for who I am and where I come from.” Those words are just so powerful, the grace and maturity that Marcus carries himself with is astonishing for a 23-year-old. And yet throughout all of this he still manages to come across as a regular guy, never being condescending or patronising. Just Marcus.
Marcus has been there and provided for all of us both on and off the pitch. And now more than ever it’s our duty to provide for him and protect him from those wanting to try and bring him down. We need to stand up and call out those taking shots at him and any other players in similar situations.