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Kieron Dyer and Titus Bramble speak out against the ‘Rooney Rule’

9 years ago
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Former Newcastle players Kieron Dyer and Titus Bramble have spoken out against the ‘Rooney Rule’ being implemented in English football.

The Rooney Rule was implemented in American Football to tackle the problem of so few Coaches in the NFL being drawn from minorities.

The name originated from owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers, Dan Rooney, who championed the cause.

The ‘rule’means that when a new coach is appointed, candidates from minorities have to be interviewed, though there is no obligation on what background any successful candidate should be from.

However, the reality was that in the NFL after the rule was implemented in 2003, by 2006 the number of African American coache shad jumped from 6% to 22%.

With so few coaches/managers from minority backgrounds featuring in English football, there is mow momentum behind the campaign to implement a similar ‘Rooney Rule’ on this side of the Atlantic.

However, Titus Bramble and Kieron Dyer have told the Daily Telegraph that they are vehemently against the idea, Bramble calling it a ‘disgrace’.

Both former Newcastle players who played under Sir Bobby Robson at St.James’ Park, are now coaching at Ipswich and had the following to say.

Kieron Dyer;

“I don’t want to be interviewed because it is filling a quota.”

While Titus Bramble said;

“The rule is a disgrace and you could say it is just as bad being given the job because of your skin colour as it is not being given the job.

“I would like to see the figures which show how many black players want to go into coaching. I can say that because I am black and I am struggling to think of a single black teammate who showed any interest in coaching. Kieron is the only one.”

It will be interesting to see how this develops but I bet there are plenty of Titus Bramble’s teammates, both black and non-black, who will find his comments a bit bizarre regarding so few black players being interested in the coaching side.

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