Other soccer managers may not be bothered by Malcolm “Malky” Mackay’s texting habits. It’s just that everyone else is disgusted.
Earlier this week, the Scotsman was considered the front-runner for the managerial opening at Premier League club Crystal Palace until talks between him and the club came to an abrupt end.
The reason negotiations ceased: a report filed with the Football Association, English football’s governing body, by Mackay’s former club, Cardiff City, detailing racist, sexist and homophobic texts he sent to his former co-worker Iain Moody before being fired.
Mackay and Moody both have a beef with the former club and its eccentric owner, Vincent Tan, but neither has stepped forward to question the veracity of the texts.
The dossier alleges that while at the Welsh club, Mackay and Moody, who was at that point the club’s head of recruitment, exchanged texts that, among other things, made a derogatory comment about South Korean player Kim Bo-Kyung, called an executive at another club an untrustworthy “gay snake” and referenced a female agent’s “falsies,” reports the Daily Mail.
“Not many white faces amongst that lot but worth considering,” read another text referring to players the duo were evaluating.
Besides making Mackay all but unhireable, the report cost Moody his job. After leaving Cardiff, he had become the sporting director at Crystal Palace, a position he resigned from on Thursday, the club announced.
Mackay received some support from other managers, but that only made matters worse.
A statement released by the League Managers Association on Thursday positioned the texts as nothing more than Mackay “letting off steam to a friend during some friendly text message banter,” reports the Guardian.
Having received immediate and massive criticism for the statement, the association released another statement Friday apologizing for the “wording” of the previous release.
Queens Park Rangers coach Harry Redknapp also clumsily weighed in on the matter, saying Mackay was a “fantastic lad,” and that while the vile texts were a “big mistake,” the texts weren’t all that bad, all things considered.
“I’m not condoning what he has done but show me someone who has never made a mistake and I will show you a liar,” he said. “He hasn’t murdered anyone, he hasn’t raped anyone and he is not a pedophile.”
Mackay, who apologized for the texts on Thursday, and Moody aren’t out of trouble just yet. The Daily Mail reports that Cardiff haven’t ruled out a complaint to the police yet.