If you are a gay footballer in Italy keep it hidden says the head of the Italian Players Union, and former Roma star, Damiano Tommasi.
Yes it seems that Italian football is still not prepared to join the 21st century and be comfortable with gay players in the game. The head of the players union, Damiano Tommasi, has had his say on the matter and he has some advice for any footballers thinking of coming out.
“It’s to be discouraged. The fact of being identified or singled out as ‘the one who is’, regardless of your profession, whether journalist, footballer or politician, I don’t think it would be an advisable path to take.
“Expressing your personal sexuality is difficult in every professional environment and even more so for a footballer who shares a changing room with his team-mates, and hence also his intimacy with others.
“In our world it could cause embarrassment. In a sport in which you get undressed it could cause an extra difficulty in cohabitation,” he said.
Tommasi played over 400 games for club and country but claims he has never met a gay footballer.
“I personally never met any gay footballers but then again maybe I did without knowing their homosexual tendencies,” he said.
You probably did Damiano, but we think we know they never said anything now. As football ponders the events of recent weeks in Germany and England, it would have been positive for players’ representatives to advocate openness and people speaking about problems rather than keeping things bottled up.
Makes you grateful for the GPA and the way Donal Og Cusack’s coming out has been handled in our country, doesn’t it?
