Chelsea left back, England regular, but never one to hit the headlines for the wrong reasons, Graeme Le Saux was ever the consummate professional during his playing career.
That’s in stark contrast to the current occupant of the Chelsea number three shirt, with Ashley Cole all over the news again for his recent rant on Twitter berating the F.A. Le Saux believes footballers should be more responsible with what they write on social media sites, and realise the consequences their words could potentially have.
Should footballers’ tweets be policed in the way that they are though? When Steve Cotterill took over as Nottingham Forest manager in October 2011, he installed a rule that any player who mentioned the club, the players or the fans on Twitter would be fined a £1000 a word, but what’s wrong with talking about such things?
This isn’t Fight Club Steve. The very idea of Twitter is to bridge the gap between players and fans, but if the players can’t talk about the things that fans follow them for, what is the point? It’s an ongoing issue that shows no sign of being resolved anytime soon, but you feel it’s time for those in authority to loosen the reins a little.
That’s not to say we should condone Ashley Cole for his words,after all, a man who is nearing one hundred England caps should know better, but in an era of increasing player power, something has got to be done sooner rather later to stop all the bravado.
By Sean Monaghan
Follow @sean_monaghan_