OPINION
By Daniel Storey
Chief Football Writer
Jordan Henderson interview: 7 claims he made about his transfer to Saudi Arabia – and why they’re all wrong
The former LGBT+ ally has gone to the oppressive Gulf state to play football, live in a lovely house and earn lots of money. Why won’t he just admit it?
September 5, 2023 12:03 pm(Updated September 6, 2023 9:01 am)
Jordan Henderson gets to make his case about why he made his move to Al-Ettifaq – he has done so in an extensive interview with The Athletic. And we get to have the right of reply to detail exactly why none of it makes sense…
“People can believe me or not, but in my life and my career, money has never been a motivation. Ever. Don’t get me wrong, when you move, the business deal has to be tight. You have to have financials, you have to feel wanted, you have to feel valued. And money is a part of that.”
Indeed. It’s funny how money is never a motivation for the people who have just been given a whacking great pay rise. Henderson is at pains to say that he never discussed money with his manager Steven Gerrard, but then why would he? Those discussions were never going to be between player and coach – that’s what agents are for. And the money was never not going to be eye-watering.
Henderson isn’t foolish. He was not the first player to be targeted by the Saudi Pro League and we all heard the reports of vast wages. He refutes the highest estimates of his salary, but he has just been given the biggest rise of his life to play for a mid-table team in a league that, generously, ranked outside the world’s top 30 last year.
Jordan Henderson left his morals at the door when Saudi Arabia waved £700k a week in his face
DANIEL STOREY
The rise of that league is entirely fuelled by the vast investment of the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia. To play down the financial element of all this just comes across as incredibly bad faith.
“So do I go somewhere to try something new, to grow the game that I love in another country, and grow the league into one of the best in the world? That excites me because I want to grow the sport all over the world. And that got me going, really.”
If Henderson’s goal has long been to grow the sport of football all over the world, spending his entire professional life between the ages of 18 and 33 exclusively playing for Sunderland, Liverpool and Coventry City feels pretty unimaginative. So we are to believe that he wanted to grow the game across the world but chose to stay in England until a vast financial offer came from Saudi Arabia at the age of 33? Well wasn’t that an absolute stroke of good fortune.
Also, without taking a swipe at Henderson, I’m not totally convinced that him moving to Al-Ettifaq to be one of many uber-rich ageing footballers in a league pumped full with state cash is quite “growing the game” in the way well-meaning people usually use that phrase.
“I think there was always going to be criticism regardless of what I did, whether I stayed, whether I went. So basically I had to make the decision on what was best for me and my family.”
No. No, no, no. And this is where it gets serious, Jordan. You get to make your own choices (and be criticised for them). You get to take the money or “grow the game” or whatever. But you do not get to equate the two options you are now presenting as equals.
You were given two options: move to Saudi Arabia, with all the associated issues around LGBT+ rights that you must have known would be understandably used against you, or not move to Saudi Arabia. To suggest that you would have been criticised either way, that that criticism would have been of equal importance and therefore that you had to only focus on yourself and your family, ignoring all of the LGBT+ issues, is a gross (in more ways than one) betrayal.
“Now, when I was making the decision, the way that I tried to look at it was I felt as though, by myself not going, we can all bury our heads in the sand and criticise different cultures and different countries from afar. But then nothing’s going to happen. Nothing’s going to change.”
We hear this argument a lot – the “forcing change from the inside” strategy. It’s also a complete straw man argument. If Henderson had said no to the Saudi offer and announced he was standing by the LGBT+ communities to whom he had previously been an ally, nobody would have accused him of burying his head in the sand. He would simply have been a very rich man turning down the chance to be an even richer man for moral reasons. Those communities whom he supported would have celebrated his decision.
Instead, Henderson sells himself as some inside man, a sleeper agent for forcing socio-political change – that’s just garbage. He’s gone over there to play football, live in a lovely house and earn lots of money. And everything Henderson subsequently says proves as much. He is not fighting the good fight here; he is fighting no fight at all.
Also, and this really does bear repeating over and over again, it is acceptable to criticise a culture in which homosexuality is illegal and it is acceptable not to profit from it. Heterosexuality and homosexuality are not lifestyle choices nor a quirky element of culture. They are an inherent part of who we are as human beings and as such are human rights. While specific communities are ostracised, mistreated and live in fear, their cause should be the priority (if you really care about them at all).
“I see that because, from their [Saudi] side, they knew that before signing it. So they knew what my beliefs were. They knew what causes and campaigns I’ve done in the past and not once was it brought up. Not once have they said, ‘You can do this, you can’t do this.’”
Well that’s awfully good of them. But then it also misses the point. Henderson was a useful target for Saudi Arabia because he had been an ally of LGBT+ rights. If they could persuade him, they could persuade any player.
And Saudi Arabia might not have told Henderson to change directly, but things are changing. In his announcement video, his rainbow armband was repeatedly greyed out. Henderson now says that if the armband disrespects Saudi culture then he should not wear it, which sounds an awful lot like a change of behaviour to me.
In the same section, Henderson insists that he is not being paid anything (and that there is no contractual obligation) to post anything on social media related to Saudi Arabia. Which means that his latest tweet – “The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the hospitality of the hosts, the enthusiasm of the fans, the exciting league and the irreplaceable sense of victory” – was all from the heart. Makes you feel all warm inside.
“We had a meeting with the FA about human rights, about the issues around the stadiums. I think it might have been Amnesty who had sent the images and stuff. And then, half an hour later, I go into a press conference or some media and I’ve commented on that situation. I was like, ‘Well, it was quite shocking and horrendous”’and that was quite hard for us to see. But then when I went to Qatar and we had the experience we had at the World Cup, you get to meet the workers there and it was totally different.”
It’s really hard to know who to believe, isn’t it. Do you believe the evidence of Amnesty International, a human rights organisation who repeatedly stressed the need for the England squad to be educated on the associated human rights issues? Do you believe the testimony of the LGBT+ community on the ground in the Middle East, living in fear to be themselves? Do you believe all the reporting on the deep-set issues around the treatment of migrant workers at the Qatar World Cup?
Or do you meet a few deliberately selected people who were paraded in front of you at a manicured PR shoot and ignore all of the above? It’s not as if Qatar might have wanted to present a manufactured portrayal of the situation to deflect criticism, is it. At this point I’m not sure if Henderson is down the rabbit hole or just nonsensically blind to assessing the strength of evidence.
“I want to learn as well. Because it’s hard for me to hear some of the stuff that I’ve heard and I want to learn why that’s the case and how I can help going forward.”
Sorry Jordan, but you had your chance there. The most angering element of this interview is that Henderson presents the order of events as him choosing to move and then suddenly an unexpected torrent of criticism hits him like a wave. But that’s just not true. He was advised by exactly the people who he had been an ally for, when the rumours of a Saudi Arabia move surfaced, that he could not do this.
That was the time to learn. That was the time to “help going forward”. You don’t get to hear all that advice, all that testimony, decide that you have to decide only what is best for you and your family, take the offer and then suddenly say “right guys, I’m ready to learn so how can I help?”.
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