British MPs and Peers have urged the Football Association (FA) to ban men posing as women from participating in women’s football.
This call follows an incident in the Sheffield and Hallamshire League, where four women’s teams opted out of playing against a transgender player, a man using the name Francesca Needham, after a girl suffered a significant knee injury while trying to block this player.
The letter was sent by Miriam Cates and co-signed by 42 Conservative MPs, two Labour MPs, two from the Democratic Unionist Party and one from the Alba Party, along with 27 members of the House of Lords.
According to the letter, the FA has turned “a blind eye” on the issue and passed the buck to “individual clubs and managers” instead of issuing clear instructions on whether trans players can join women’s soccer teams.
Mr. Needham’s case has ignited a contentious debate, involving a minimum of 50 men (transgender) transgender players currently participating in women’s leagues across England.
Miriam Cates MP, the lead signatory, brought up the issue in the House of Commons last week, emphasising the importance of prioritising safety.
Miriam Cates MP
She pointed out that, unlike the Rugby Football Union and British Cycling, the FA has so far ignored the impact transgender inclusion has on women’s participation. Not only that, it’s dangerous.
The Conservative MP for Penistone and Stocksbridge said: ‘Allowing males to compete in women’s and girls’ teams undermines that principle of fairness and puts women and girls in danger.
‘It’s deeply concerning that women’s teams in South Yorkshire have had to pull out of matches due to fears for players’ physical safety when playing against a male opponent.’
More reactions
Former FA Chairman, Lord Triesman, reacting to protecting women’s rights in football said: ‘As the governing body for all levels of football in England, the FA should be paying particular attention to issues affecting amateur and semi-professional clubs.
‘Recent incidents have shown there is a pressing need for strong central guidance to ensure that women and girls are not disadvantaged or put at risk of physical harm. I am calling on the FA to make it clear that male-bodied players should not be playing on women’s teams or in women’s leagues.’
Maya Forstater, executive director of Sex Matters, said: ‘There is nothing in the Equality Act or the Gender Recognition Act that says women’s sports must be opened up to men who identify as women. In fact, the Football Association, the most influential sporting association in the UK, is discriminating against women and girls by not protecting women’s teams. It is totally unacceptable for the FA knowingly to be putting women in harm’s way.’
Discrimination claims?
In a now-deleted post on Rossington Main Ladies’ Facebook page last month, Mr Needham said he had quit football when rival clubs refused to take part in matches against him.
‘As some of you may have heard, Rossington Main Ladies FC has faced challenges from teams unwilling to play against us while I am on the field,” the player wrote.
‘This unfortunate circumstance has prompted me to investigate pursuing a case of discrimination, as I believe it represents a breach of the code of conduct regarding diversity and inclusion, as well as safeguarding of adults in football established by both the Football Association and the Sheffield and Hallamshire Women and Girls League.’
Misrepresentation of women
Nathan “Naomi’ O’Brien
Women have persistently grappled with misrepresentation, especially within the media and various organisations.
In a recent article, The Daily Mail refers to men as ‘She.’ But in an even more concerning instance, Greater Manchester Police, in a tweet stated: ‘A man and a woman have been sentenced to a combined 16 years and 9 months in prison for their roles in the sexual abuse of a child.’
Detective Inspector Marsden referred to the ‘female suspect,’ identified as ‘Naomi O’Brien.’ However, this information was inaccurate, as evident from the photo posted by the police. The real name of the suspect is Nathan. The other offender was Nathan’s boyfriend, Jonathan Walker, revealing the case involved two gay individuals.
The misleading characterisation of a male sex offender as a ‘predatory female’ by the police not only deceives the public, it also distorts crime statistics.
The Bible says, Isaiah 59:14-15 And judgment is turned away backward, and justice standeth afar off: for truth is fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter. Yea, truth faileth; and he that departeth from evil maketh himself a prey: and the LORD saw it, and it displeased him that there was no judgment.
‘Man in a wig’
Tory MP Rachel MacLean came under pressure to delete her post and issue an apology to Green Party candidate Matthew Viner, who now identifies as Melissa, following her reference to him as a ‘man in a wig.’
The Conservative deputy chair for women shared a post on X, formerly Twitter, describing Matthew Viner as a ‘man who wears a wig and calls himself a ‘proud lesbian.’
She added a comment: ‘While the Greens don’t know what a woman is, my Worcestershire neighbours, the people of Bromsgrove certainly do.’
Meanwhile, Joe Baker, Labour group leader at Redditch Borough Council, criticised Mrs. Maclean’s comments and described them as ‘absolutely vile and hateful’. While Tory MP Wendy Morton said Ms. Maclean failed to show due ‘respect’ towards ‘Poulton’ and his new identity.
In 2019, Matthew Viner stood for the Conservative Party in the Wyre Forest council elections under his real name. Yet the Greens, the BBC, and even the Daily Telegraph refer to him as ‘she’.
Made in God’s image
Undoubtedly, everyone is created in the image and likeness of God. However, those who attempt to alter creation by all forms of mutilation spits in the face of God, who created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.
We call for repentance and possibly deliverance.
The Bible says, 1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
READ: Psalm 26:5; Isaiah 7:15,59:14; Micah 6:8; Mark 12:30-31; John 14:15; Rom 12:2; Col 3:2; Timothy 2:22; 2Pet 2:6-10; 2 Jude 1:7; Rev. 22:15.
PRAY: for the repeal of woke laws in the UK.
Thank God for leaders speaking up against evil and wickedness
Pray that sodomy will not take over Britain. Pray for repentance of those that have sinned.
Pray for the wisdom of God upon our leaders.
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(Stop Press: The Emilia Romagna Grand Prix in Italy on Sunday 21st May 2023 which we refer to in the video was cancelled owing to extensive rainfall and flooding which has to date tragically taken 14 lives. Please pray for those caught up in it all. The next F1 Grand Prix took place on Sunday 28th May 2023 in Monte Carlo, Monaco. Lewis came fourth. )
Sir Lewis Hamilton used the occasion of last weekend’s 2023 Miami Grand Prix to blunder into the Florida sex education debate. So let’s look at that debate, at Lewis’s descent into wokeness and how since he went on that path his racing career appears to have stalled. Watch our video (you are reading the transcript):
According to the BBC: ‘Florida governor Ron DeSantis is set to widen a law barring public schools from teaching about sexual orientation and gender identity to all grades.’
The law is officially titled the ‘Parental Rights in Education Act’. It was passed in 2022 and currently applies to public, or state, schools from kindergarten, only up to ‘third grade’, which is 8-9 year-olds.
Extension of the law
In April 2023, the Florida Board of Education approved an extension of the ban to all grades, primary and secondary.
Mr DeSantis and other Republicans who support the law, and the extension, say it shields children from inappropriate content that does not belong in schools. They argue that parents, not teachers, should be holding discussions on topics like sexual orientation and gender identity with their children. The Bible supports them. In the Old Testament, in the book of Deuteronomy, chapter six, the Lord tells his people this about his laws:
Deut 6:7 And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.
Bring up your children in the Lord
And of course the New Testament agrees. We read in the Gospel of Luke, chapter two and verse fifty-one that the Lord Jesus was subject to his mother and father, while the Apostle Paul wrote to the Ephesians also in chapter six:
Eph 6:4 And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.
Parents, the Bible tells us, are responsible for their children’s education, not teachers, not sex educators, not LGBTQ+, or whatever the latest version is, activists.
Florida Commissioner of Education Manny Diaz Jr said in a tweet: ‘Students should be spending their time in school learning core academic subjects, not being force-fed radical gender and sexual ideology.’
As expected, Democratic President Joe Biden has called the law ‘hateful.’ Gay and Trans activists in the State and indeed across the US are also furious.
Rainbow Flag on his helmet
Lewis Hamilton’s LGBT Rainbow Helmet
And into the shallow mud of opposition has now waded our own national treasure Sir Lewis Hamilton to campaign for homosexuals and trans activists against parents and decency.
‘It’s not good. At all,’ said our Lewis. ‘I stand by the LGBTQ community here and hope they continue to push back.’
Push back against parental rights and responsibilities, eh? Mr Hamilton said he would race in Miami with a rainbow flag in support of LGBTQ rights on his helmet.
‘It is no different to when we were in Saudi,’ the Mercedes driver added. ‘It is not the right direction and not the right message.’
Oh dear, Lewis, in two places in the book of Proverbs we read:
Prov 14:12 (c/f 16:25) There is a way that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.
‘I am here and hoping that just by showing up with my helmet I will be continuing to support the LGBT community and showing I stand with them in solidarity. I hope they continue to fight against it,’ he went on
Oh, Lewis. ‘Showing up’ with his rainbow helmet. It was, no doubt, the least he could do. But seriously, with his words and his helmet Lewis is trying to change opinion. He is interfering in another nation’s internal affairs. just as we see Western governments and foundations and sportsmen like the gay Tom Daley doing all over the world. And of course there is a spiritual dimension to Lewis’s intervention, coming inevitably from his secularist worship of a false woke god. The Lord’s Prophet Jeremiah said:
Jer 23:26 How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets that prophesy lies? yea, they are prophets of the deceit of their own heart;
Sex Education is ‘Vital’
Sir Lewis went on: ‘My sympathy and thoughts are with the people here in Miami. It’s not them making the decisions, it’s the people in government and that’s the issue.’
Really? Only last year Ron DeSantis beat his Democratic challenger Charlie Crist by over 19 percentage points. The Florida Governor specifically campaigned on the culture war and against the ‘woke’ values of Sir Lewis Hamilton and his celebrity friends.
You know, we are constantly told by the education establishment here in the UK that sex education is always age-appropriate, that it is essential to help children understand the modern world and that parents have nothing to worry about.
But now Lewis has given the game away. Sex Education is actually designed to promote homosexuality and transgenderism to children. It is apparently an essential plank in the armoury of gay and trans activists. It is, in the words of our own Director of Ofsted Amanda Spielman, ‘vital’ for children to hear the gay and trans ideology in Relationships and Sex Education. ‘Vital’, that is, for the woke cause. And it seems it is ‘vital’ for them world-wide.
That explains Plan International and the ‘gender-queer’ Comprehensive Sexuality Education toolkit that that Western-funded NGO tried to sneak into Rwanda.
It explains concerned parents being excluded from school board meetings across the United States. But there is a judgment coming. The Bible says:
Eccl 5:8 If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at the matter: for he that is higher than the highest regardeth; and there be higher than they.
Seven World Titles
Back in the previous decade, it seemed as if the Lewis Hamilton / Mercedes partnership was unstoppable in Formula One. He won his first world championship in 2008 with McLaren.
He joined Mercedes in 2013, winning his second championship the following year. He won again in 2015.
Lewis lost the 2016 title to his team-mate Nico Rosberg, but went on to win four in a row from 2017 to 2020. Seven world titles equalled the record of Michael Schumacher. In our house, we cheered and prayed for the fresh-faced boy from Stevenage all the way.
But something changed during 2020. On 25th May, George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, was murdered while being arrested in Minneapolis, Minnesota, by Derek Chauvin, a 44-year-old US police officer. The fact that the policeman was white gave ammunition to a Marxist-feminist bunch called ‘Black Lives Matter’, led by three fiercely anti-family, anti-capitalist lesbians. I say, ‘anti-capitalist’ but they certainly prospered from the death of the Mr Floyd. Derek Chauvin has since been convicted.
Going ‘woke’
In the wake of the murder, Lewis demanded his Mercedes be painted black and he started doing the knee business to show his support for the wealthy anti-family Marxists. Then in 2021 he switched his attention to homosexuality. He commissioned what Pink News described as ‘his intersex-inclusive Progress Pride flag helmet’ for the inaugural Grand Prix in Qatar, which he won. Why those born with the unfortunate intersex condition are dragged in, I have no idea, except for shameless political reasons, of course. The inaugural Saudi Arabia Grand Prix followed and Lewis won that too, also in his rainbow helmet.
Then followed the 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Lewis turned up in his woke helmet for the third time in solidarity with homosexuality. Sodomy is illegal in all three countries. I suppose refusing to take part was not an option for a man with an eye on an eighth world title.
But look, here are three Muslim countries following the laws of God, which say, in Leviticus chapter twenty:
Lev 20:13 If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
You might object to that penalty, but in the UK there is no penalty at all for sodomy. Instead, it is promoted to 4-year-olds in school.
Bringing shame on the UK
Lewis was only calling attention to our national sin, bringing shame in Muslim eyes on the constitutional Christian country he represents. Moreover, his pro-gay virtue, or vice-signalling provides an additional reason to persecute individual Christians in that part of the world.
Anyway, the Abu Dhabi race was held on 12th December 2021. Coming into the race, Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton each had 369.5 points. Lewis needed to win. He made a good start and led for most of the race. He appeared on course to win what would have been a record eighth World Drivers’ Championship. But as Jonny Cash sang, ‘You can run on for a long time, sooner or later God’ll cut you down.’ Or as the Bible says:
Prov 16:18 Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.
On lap 53 of the 58-lap race Nicholas Latifi crashed his Williams and out came the safety car. Max Verstappen went into the pits for a change of tyres. Lewis stayed out. A controversial and erroneous safety car restart made it a one-lap race. Lewis, with his old tyres, was a sitting duck for the Dutchman, who overtook the Mercedes driver in the last moments of the race, clinching the championship.
Three days later, on 15th December 2021, Lewis Hamilton was knighted by the then Prince of Wales for services to motorsports. Some consolation.
Troubles at Mercedes
The official who made the wrong decision was demoted, but the race result stood. And then it really started to go wrong for Sir Lewis, and for his team-mate George Russell. After a re-design, the Mercedes car which emerged for the 2022 season appeared to have both an engine deficit and suspension problems. From eleven wins and three more podium finishes (that’s second or third) in 2020 and eight wins and a further nine podiums in 2021, the best Lewis could manage last year was nine podium finishes and no wins at all. Since he started racing, there had never been a season when Lewis did not win at least one race.
The car, and Lewis, are faring no better in 2023, with just one podium finish in five races. Lewis finished 6th in Miami, with his Mercedes team-mate George Russell in 4th place. In fairness, in the drivers’ overall standings those positions are reversed.
An upgraded Mercedes is coming for the next race, Emilia Romagna in Italy on Sunday 21st May 2023. However, team boss Toto Wolff is only looking to ‘make inroads into Red Bull’s advantage at the front’ and to be ‘the best of the rest’.
‘We just need to manage everybody’s expectation because we’re talking so much about that upgrade,’ he said. ‘We’re not going to put it down on the track and then drive circles around Red Bull, but it’s going be a good baseline, I think.’
Nasty Piece of Work
How can a car which was so good, suddenly become so bad? Why has it become, in Mr Wolff’s words, such ‘a nasty piece of work’ from one year to the next? Why, for that matter, was Lewis on the receiving end of such a poor decision in Abu Dhabi after such an unexpected late crash in only his third outing in his rainbow helmet? Just what is going on? Is he now under a curse? Well, how can there not be a spiritual dimension to these extraordinary catastrophes? If you disagree, what are you saying? That God would not do that? Or that God could not do that? The Bible says in the book of Ecclesiastes:
Eccl 9:11 I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.
But then again, the Bible promises success to those who follow God’s ways, for example, to Joshua:
Joshua 1:8 This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.
And to us all, in the very first Psalm, with a warning to Lewis and his LGBTQ friends:
Psa 1:1 Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. 2 But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night. 3 And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
Psa 1:4 The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. 5 Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. 6 For the LORD knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.
Pray for his repentance
We don’t pray any more in our house for success for Lewis Hamilton. We pray now for his repentance. By choosing to support the enemies of the Lord he has put himself in the camp of the ungodly, the sinners and the scornful. The Bible says, in the book of Numbers:
Numb 10:35 And it came to pass, when the ark set forward, that Moses said, Rise up, LORD, and let thine enemies be scattered; and let them that hate thee flee before thee.
Will Sir Lewis Hamilton ever achieve that eighth world drivers’ championship and become the Greatest of All Time, or at least, the One with the Most Titles?
Or will he be like his friend the equally celebrity-woke Serena Williams, desperately chasing that one last title to, in Serena’s case, just take her level with Margaret Court, the Evangelical Christian derided by the press and the glitterati as ‘homophobic’? Serena never made it and has now retired. Margaret Court’s place in history is secure, as is her place in heaven. We read in the psalms:
Psa 146:9 The LORD preserveth the strangers; he relieveth the fatherless and widow: but the way of the wicked he turneth upside down.
That is the kind of God he is. On one level, Lewis has entertained the people and made his money. He has enjoyed success. But ambition is built into all of us. It is part of being made in the image of God. I am sure Lewis wants that eighth title. What a pity he has turned his back on the God who gave him his gift and who could give him his final goal if he would only humble himself and repent. The Lord Jesus said:
Matt 13:41 The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; 42 And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.
Yes, he is a God of judgment. But he is a God of mercy, and if your own life is being lived in rebellion from God, you too can turn from your wickedness right now, accept the Lord Jesus as your Saviour, your God and your King, and live to the full his risen life.
More scripture on pride…
2Chron 16:9a For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to shew himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him. Psa 94:2 Lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth: render a reward to the proud. Psa 119:21 Thou hast rebuked the proud that are cursed, which do err from thy commandments. Psa 138:6 Though the LORD be high, yet hath he respect unto the lowly: but the proud he knoweth afar off. Isa 2:12 For the day of the LORD of hosts shall be upon every one that is proud and lofty, and upon every one that is lifted up; and he shall be brought low: Jer 50:31 Behold, I am against thee, O thou most proud, saith the Lord GOD of hosts: for thy day is come, the time that I will visit thee. Luke 1:51 He hath shewed strength with his arm; he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. Luke 14:11 For whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted. Romans 1:30 Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, James 4:6 But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.
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A football league team doctor has characterised players refusing the Covid-19 vaccination as easily-led and likened them to flat-earthers during a BBC broadcast.
Rochdale AFC’s Dr Wesley Tensel told BBC mid-day news on 5th October that players will be watching ‘misinformation’ about Covid or vaccines on social media. One video links to another, he told viewers, and ‘pretty soon you are believing the earth is flat’.
This refusal to grant players basic intelligence comes from a man who Sportsmail reports called for the whole football league season to be stopped in December 2020 amid a rise in cases at the time. In the event, some games were postponed including two involving Rochdale but the season continued.
Cryptocurrency and Botox
On Twitter, where his self-description includes ‘Property Investor & Cryptocurrency Trader’, Dr Tensel complains: “Whenever I’m running a vaccination clinic I’ll WhatsApp all the boys but it’s got to the point where nobody replies.” He told BBC’s Rachel Burden that ‘anti-vax messages’ mean that only around 20% of his (Rochdale) players are double vaxxed. The BMJ reports that GP’s receive £12.58 per double-jab administered.
Wesley Tensel was linked to Chloe Goodman’s Opiah Cosmetics
The Daily Star reported in 2016 that consultant plastic surgeon Charles Durrant criticised Dr Tensel for providing medical cover to an ex ‘On The Beach’ star called Chloe Goodman for her then Leeds-based clinic Opiah Cosmetics, which provided botox and fillers.
The law states that botox must be prescribed by a doctor or nurse practitioner. It must be prescribed for the actual patient, ideally after a consultation with the prescriber. Miss Goodman, who recently had a baby with Middlesborough defender Grant Hall, stated that she was working with clinical oversight from Dr Tensel. It was not clear if he saw all her botox customers.
Mr Charles, a member of The British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons said: “Having a GP prescribe medication that someone else injects into someone’s face is abhorrent really. It’s outrageous.”
The Star reports that when they asked him for a response, Dr Tensel simply stated that Charles Durrant is “entitled to his opinions”. Since 2016, it appears Opiah Cosmetics has moved to Brighton and offers injectable lip fillers but no longer Botox. If you are interested to know the difference, click here. However, a booking site for Opiah refers to ‘btox’ and has ‘The Cutting Room’ in Leeds as a venue.
Wrong side of history
In December 2020 Dr Tensel said football ‘must be included should the government propose another lockdown’. He said football ‘does not want to appear on the wrong side of history’. He went on: ‘With everything that’s going on in 2020 and this massive global pandemic, we’re struggling to get on top of things – you can see the numbers are rising. People can’t go on holiday, they can’t do this, they can’t do that,’ Dr Tensel told Sportsmail.
He went on: ‘If we look back when our kids are at school and they’re doing history of what happened in the pandemic and they see they were still playing football, they were travelling around, it just doesn’t seem to me the wisest thing to be doing.
‘I just feel that, in the grand scheme of things, is football that important in the middle of a pandemic, when I’m seeing lots and lots of people dying with Covid. It doesn’t sit right.’
Games rescheduled
Covid positive test results
One week after Dr Tensel called for the season to be stopped, ‘cases’, or rather ‘positive test results’ peaked, on 4th January 2021, and then went down week by week as fast as they had risen. After the winter spike, deaths also followed a downward trend. It was the faint-hearted Dr Tensel who ended up on the wrong side of history.
Deaths within 28 days of a positive Covid test.
The 2019-2020 season was truncated in March 2020 in the national over-reaction to the Covid epidemic. ‘Project restart’ began in June 2020 with a few ‘tidying-up’ matches held in July.
The first games of the 2020-21 season were held in September 2020. The Premier League announced in December 2020 that clubs had returned 18 positive tests during the latest round of testing. This was the highest since June. Nevertheless, all the games in all the leagues were successfully rescheduled.
Relegated
Finishing in 21st place, Rochdale were relegated after the 2019-20 season from League One to League Two. They currently sit 16th in football’s fourth tier.
Rochdale AFC holds the distinction of having played the most seasons in the English Football League’s bottom two tiers of the four divisions (which are now named ‘Premiership’, ‘Championship’, ‘League One’ and ‘League Two’) without ever reaching the top two tiers or being relegated to the National League.
The club was formed in 1907 and entered the Football League, Third Division North, on 27th August 1921 with a 6-3 win against Accrington. One hundred years in the League is quite an achievement. They will need the Lord’s blessing to remain and progress, and that will only come by following Kingdom principles. Unity is a key Kingdom principle. It commands a blessing, as we know from Psalm 133. People in the club publicly criticisng others in the club does the opposite.
Football’s Refuseniks
The mainstream media have been full of a story that a very sizeable number of Premiership footballers are refusing the vaccine. Yahoo news is airing a Press Association story which says: ‘A report this week suggested only seven of the 20 Premier League clubs have succeeded in fully vaccinating 50 per cent or more of their squads, with the overall average said to be approximately one-third of all players. Due to medical confidentiality the Premier League will not confirm exact numbers.’
Disappointed: Health Secretary Sajid Javid MP
At least five members of the England squad are reportedly among them. Health Secretary Sajid Javid has said it is ‘disappointing’ and that ‘the players are role models who could play a part in encouraging others to get the jab.’
But that works both ways. They can be role models, even in the changing room, encouraging others who in conscience or for health reasons are refusing it.
‘Misinformation’ online
Sports minister Nigel Huddleston blamed the poor uptake on ‘misinformation online.’ It’s always ‘misinformation online’. He said the government were working ‘with social media companies to tackle fake news about vaccinations’. Government propaganda must prevail.
However, after a briefing from England’s deputy chief medical officer Jonathan Van-Tam, England football manager Gareth Southgate said: ‘What we do know is that, even with the vaccination, it’s not going to stop people catching it.’
Mr Southgate went on confirming the point, which is not ‘misinformation’: ‘Even if they are vaccinated, we still have to take those precautions because they can still catch it and therefore be ruled out of games, so it’s a strange one for us.
‘I … understand young people are going to have individual views on how they see it and they’re going to be influenced by what they read and what they see, so it is a far from straightforward cycle.’
Are players that stupid, Doctor?
Some media have said that black and ethnic minority players are the most likely to refuse the vaccine. That may be true, but the Rochdale first team has just three black players in its 23-man squad and yet Dr Tensel says only 20% of the whole Rochdale squad have been double-vaxxed.
In any event, surely, as their team doctor, Dr Tensel should be supporting players rather than accusing them of being so stupid they are unable to form their own opinion of the comparative risk from the virus and the vaccine or saying they are so easily led by what they see online that they are about to believe the earth is flat.
But such conceit can so easily happen when you decide that only you are right and so much cleverer than those who merely kick a ball about. Without for a moment doubting his motives, the doctor is nevertheless promoting a view acceptable to the arrogant men in power. But the Bible says:
Proverbs 16:19 Better it is to be of an humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide the spoil with the proud.
More risk from vaccine
With a humble spirit, Dr Tensel should recognise that those who have decided not to be vaccinated have sought out knowledge, not ‘misinformation’. They know they are at little risk from the Covid virus. The worst case was Newcastle goalkeeper Karl Darlow who was laid out with it for a month but is now recovering.
Players also know there are risks, chiefly possible heart inflammation, particularly for young men, with the vaccine, especially in those double-vaccinated.
The US Centers for Disease Control say: ‘Cases of myocarditis reported to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) external icon have occurred: After mRNA COVID-19 vaccination (Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna), especially in male adolescents and young adults.’ Evidence is also piling up from Israel, Canada, Ireland, Europe and the UK. It was one reason the UK’s JCVI gave not to recommend vaccines for adolescent school-children. Concerns of an “increased incidence” of heart inflammation diseases myocarditis and pericarditis following inoculation, especially after the second dose is the reason Iceland, Sweden, Finland and Denmark, have all stopped giving the Moderna vaccine to young men.
Furthermore, AstraZeneca’s vaccine is not recommended in the UK for under-18’s at all, because of the risk of thrombosis (blood clots), which although rare could be ‘devastating’, according to consultant haematologist Dr Sue Pavord.
Any of these vaccine ill-effects would be self-inflicted and could end a football career. Players are not about to sacrifice themselves and their short careers in the faint hope that they might protect someone else. Particularly not when the Government and the England football manager have admitted they can still pass the virus on, vaccinated or not. Delving down to that knowledge makes them prudent and wise, in Bible language:
Proverbs 18:15 The heart of the prudent getteth knowledge; and the ear of the wise seeketh knowledge.
Prayer
Proverbs 15:33 The fear of the LORD is the instruction of wisdom; and before honour is humility.
2Tim 1:7 For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
Pray that Almighty God will vindicate and sustain those who in good conscience resist all the pressure and refuse the experimental Covid vaccines.
May he bring an end to the oppression of restrictions and consign the unjust lockdowns to the history books. May he grant repentance, humility and the fear of God to those in power.
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In a now-deleted post on Rossington Main Ladies’ Facebook page last month, Mr Needham said he had quit football when rival clubs refused to take part in matches against him.
Tory MP Rachel MacLean came under pressure to delete her post and issue an apology to Green Party candidate Matthew Viner, who now identifies as Melissa, following her reference to him as a ‘man in a wig.’
In 2019, Matthew Viner stood for the Conservative Party in the Wyre Forest council elections under his real name. Yet the Greens, the BBC, and even the Daily Telegraph refer to him as ‘she’.
