Ahead of Women's World Cup, support for Benjamin Mendy highlights deep-rooted misogyny and privilege in men's football
Ahead of Women's World Cup, support for Benjamin Mendy highlights deep-rooted misogyny and privilege in men's football
Benjamin Mendy is a free man. The former Manchester City and France defender had been accused of seven counts of rape, one count of attempted rape and one count of sexual assault against six young women in charges dating back to August 2021. He was found not guilty of all those charges in Friday’s verdict at Chester Crown Court.
The 29-year-old was partially cleared in January, but faced a retrial after the jury could not reach verdicts on claims relating to two women. Now, after almost two years, he can finally focus on rebuilding his life and also his career as a footballer.
While the verdict itself was not a surprise, the outpouring of support for Mendy from his fellow professionals was certainly unexpected. Since he was found “not guilty” of all charges, the Frenchman has been backed publicly and extremely vocally by numerous high-profile male players.
Dutch international forward Memphis Depay wrote a long post on his social media channels. “Benjamin Mendy. All cases dismissed,” he wrote. “So what are we doing now? Who is going to help this brother heal? Who’s going to be responsible for the damage on his name? How he’s going to have his career back? Many years of investment to become a professional football player…. Now what!?
“I’ve never touched on this subject because I didn’t know all the details, but I’ve spoken to him once through FaceTime while behind bars and faced him on the pitch a couple times.. I didn’t see any evil in the man. We can’t accept this to happen to us as athletes.”
One conversation on FaceTime and a couple of meetings on the pitch. Does Depay know all the details now? Because even though Mendy has been acquitted, some of the revelations from the trial make for very difficult reading.
In his own testimony, the Frenchman’s attitude towards women was shown to be disrespectful at best. “I prefer to ask to have sex after few words than to be like, ‘Hello, can you meet the next day?’, ‘Can you go for a date?’” he said during the trial. He also revealed “chat-up lines” which included “I said to her, ‘Show me your bum’. She showed me her bum and I said: ‘Do you want to have sex?’”. In addition, he told the jury how he would have unprotected sex with multiple women on the same night. Sometimes, his friends would sleep with those women too over the course of an evening.
Whether Depay is aware of any of that is unclear, but he is not the only one. The Atlético Madrid' forward’s post was ‘liked’ by a series of high-profile male footballers on Instagram, with words of support from many. “So true,” said City’s Jack Grealish, who was present at one of Mendy’s parties and was named in court as having had intercourse with one of the Frenchman’s accusers. Former England centre-back Rio Ferdinand, Arsenal defender Oleksandr Zinchenko, Real Madrid’s Antonio Rüdiger and Sevilla’s Ivan Rakitić were among many others to offer their support through comments or emojis underneath Depay’s post.
Also on Instagram, Juventus midfielder Paul Pogba posted a screenshot from a video call with Mendy, in which both can be seen with broad smiles. “So happy for you bro,” he wrote. “All the people was talking bad about you. Now I wanna see them clearing your name. Can’t wait to see you on the pitch again.” That post has been ‘liked’ by over 1.6 million people so far, including Paris-Saint Germain forward Neymar.
Real Madrid attacker Vinícius Júnior also wrote a post on his social media channels. “I’m sorry for everything you’ve been through,” he wrote. “You lost two years of your career, but that's the least of this whole situation… What about the psychological damage? Surely your life will never be the same. The culture of destroying reputations has made yet another victim.”
Vinícius, himself a victim of vile racial abuse in Spain over the past couple of years, has been enormously frustrated at the lack of punishment for his aggressors during that time. Surely he should know, better than most, that “not guilty” can be very different to “innocent” when it comes to prosecution.
Why are these footballers so keen to defend Mendy when they seemingly know so little about the case? Where was this outpouring of support for Dele Alli after he bared his soul last week with some shocking and heartbreaking revelations about his childhood? Why are they risking their reputations by sticking up for a man whose behaviour towards men is questionable at best? Who is advising them?
Perhaps they fear that their own actions will be under scrutiny in future. That they will be accused of rape or assault, falsely or otherwise, and have to go through what Mendy has experienced over the past two years. Most likely, they will want to carry on acting as they have been around women up until now.
“The Women’s World Cup starts in three days’ time, but it’s clear football still needs to work harder to build an environment that empathises with, and respects, women,” Versus said in a post on Monday.
The platform, which is based in the UK and focuses on cultural exchange and social change within football and music, said the reaction from some of the world’s most high-profile male players was “an irresponsible tone-deaf call for extra protection for a group of men that already have more privilege, power and wealth than so many others”.
The post went on to note, depressingly, that less than 1% of rape accusations in the UK result in a conviction. “In 2023, pro players know they have the power to shift attitudes and cause change. This isn’t how to do it.”
It really isn’t and ahead of an exciting month which should bring about huge change for women’s football as the World Cup kicks off in Australia and New Zealand on Thursday, these attitudes show that plenty of progress still needs to be made in the men’s game too.