On players ‘taking the knee’

Imagine a scenario where players are being booed for making gestures that contain a political statement, but when play resumes and the players clinch stunning successes, spectators in the same gallery go wild in celebrations. This is what we have been witnessing in the United Kingdom for quite some time, as footballers (taking the cue from sportspeople in the United States) started "taking a knee" since last year to highlight racial injustices and show support to the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. Frustrated in seeing such contradictory behaviour from spectators, a prominent British jurist, former Chief Prosecutor Nazir Afzal, tweeted on June 13, the day England won against Croatia in Euro 2020, "Some booing the knee & then cheering Raheem Sterling for scoring the winner just after he got his Honour for his work on racism, is some level of hypocrisy."