Last update 2 May, 2024 by Alberto Llopis
Justin Fashanu was the first player who openly acknowledged his homosexuality and also one of those athletes whose life ends in tragedy, whose story has a terrible end. A history of a sport that perhaps has not evolved in some respects everything that should.
that fact, it is shocking. In any other profession, no one asks anyone for their sexual orientation, it is something that does not matter for the development of the same. We are therefore in the XXI century, before a taboo subject, which surprisingly still. justin Fashanu It was the first to recognize but confirmed cases yet still can be counted with fingers.
¿Quién era Justin Fashanu?
For those who did not had some knowledge, was a British player of the 1990s 80-90. He born on 19 February 1961, He played in several English teams, americanos, Canadian, New Zealanders and even Swedes, but despite being a good footballer, He rose to fame not so.
He was signed in 1981 by the European champions Nottingham Forest, for the figure of one million pounds at the time. Besides, He was the first black player to be paid that amount.. During that time, rumors about your visits to gay club and its relations with those environments already beginning to reveal what was later confirmed.
In 1990 He declared publicly as gay in an exclusive interview with The Sun, becoming the only player of some importance in doing so far. The holder 22 October 1990: «£1m Football Star: I AM GAY» ("Football Star 1 millón de libras: I'M GAY").
This revelation put his career on a downhill slope without brakes.
Since then, his career went downhill. The crowd taunted their sexual orientation becoming the player the target of all eyes. Many of his colleagues, They cracked it, They are claiming that gays had no place in the world of football. Even his own brother, John Fashanu, football player also, He slits him angrily in an interview to the newspaper The Voice entitled "John Fashanu: My Gay Brother is an outcast» («John Fashanu: my gay brother is an outcast ').
His public life became untenable. They went lists and rumors about alleged sex with gay members of parliament, scandals and other. Meanwhile, his career as a player was crumbling to the point that many teams or coaches refused to give him a chance. Suddenly he had entered the eye of the storm.
His life ended tragically in the late 90
In the end, He ended his career roaming the world almost at the same time as his life.. He retired in 1997 by US. He 25 March 1998, a young man 17 years declared to the US police, which she had been sexually assaulted by justin Fashanu after a night of drinking. The British, He was questioned by police 3 of April, but he was not arrested.
Then he returned to England, pero el 3 May 1998, He was found hanging in an abandoned garage en Shoreditch, London, beside a suicide note stating: “I realized that I have already been condemned as guilty. I don't want to be an embarrassment to my friends and family anymore. I hope the Jesus I love welcomes me and finally finds peace.”.
In a very murky case and something strange, police shelved the case as suicide, thus ending the history of justin Fashanu, the first player who confessed to being homosexual, the only one who had done until later, in 2013, Robbie Rogers American player at that time Leeds, he decided to follow his path and out of the closet.
It was not the last as they principios de 2014, German Thomas Hitzlsperger would confess his tendency. Something irrelevant in another area of life but almost a mortal sin in a world like football but as real as life itself.
