A man who claims to play for a Championship club says he is set to publicly come out as gay in the near future.
‘The Gay Footballer’ Twitter account, which was created last week, has over 6,500 followers and is purported to belong to a second-tier player.
There are no active professional male footballers in England who are openly gay.
Thank you to all those who have sent supportive messages. Please understand that I only came out to my family in the last few days, I want/need the opportunity to prepare myself, and those around me, before going public. Please be patient with me.
— The Gay Footballer (@FootballerGay) July 7, 2019
A statement posted from the account on Sunday said the player’s identity would be revealed once he has prepared himself for the announcement.
“This afternoon I requested a meeting with both my manager and the club chairman,” the statement read.
“At this meeting I revealed to both gentlemen that I am a homosexual man, I explained that I had only yesterday come out to my family.
Regardless of your gender and/or sexuality, Love is Love. #LGBTQtogether pic.twitter.com/hbzVELFGGc
— The Gay Footballer (@FootballerGay) July 5, 2019
“I sought advice from both men regarding the fact that I not only want to, but will, come out publicly as a proud, confident gay professional footballer.
“As it currently stands, once I have taken the time to give full consideration to how and when I am to make it public, a press conference will be organised by the club, with invitations to be made in due course to both local and national press.”
While the tweets have received a largely positive response, the account holder did flag up some abuse aimed at him since it was opened.
The Football Association marched at Pride in London for the first time on Saturday while they have backed Stonewall’s rainbow laces campaign in recent years.
Former Aston Villa midfielder Thomas Hitzlsperger is one of the most high-profile figures to come out as gay in recent times.
The ex-Germany international had already retired before making his sexuality public, with the player purportedly behind the Gay Footballer account claiming to be under the age of 23 as he prepares to follow suit.
“I’m a professional footballer, playing for a club in the @SkyBetChamp. I will be revealing my identity soon, but I am a proud gay man, hoping to break the mould. I am under the age of 23, and today I came out to my family. Soon, I will come out publicly,” he tweeted on Friday.
PA contacted the Twitter user but has yet to receive a reply.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here