Players Booed While Kneeling for Anthem as Fans Return to Stadium
Fans of Major League Soccer who were permitted to attend a game Wednesday in Dallas booed players for kneeling during the national anthem.
FC Dallas played Nashville SC in a game that allowed fans in the stadium in a limited capacity.
Some of those fans made their presence known when players from both teams refused to stand for the country’s flag and anthem.
Nashville won the game 1-0, but one Dallas player felt more than the sting of defeat.
Defender Reggie Cannon lashed out at fans for booing him and others for kneeling during the anthem.
BBC Sport reported many fans began chanting “USA!” and booed the players as they brought leftist politics into Wednesday’s game.
“How disgraceful is that?” Cannon, who had just refused to stand for his country’s flag, stated.
“I think it was absolutely disgusting.”
FC Dallas defender Reggie Cannon has spoken out against some home fans booing players kneeling during the national anthem.
In full: https://t.co/RJTJUrFhXV pic.twitter.com/Flxm65keH8
— BBC Sport (@BBCSport) August 13, 2020
In an apparent reference to the Black Lives Matter movement, the player attacked his own fans for not supporting his politics.
“You got fans booing you for people taking a stand for what they believe in. Millions of other people support this cause, and we discussed with every other team and the league what we’re going to do, and we’ve got fans booing us in our own stadium,” he said, according to the BBC.
After fans gave Cannon’s political activism an icy reception, he added, “I think it was absolutely disgusting.”
Angel Madison Franco, a Dallas sportswriter, tweeted that some fans threw “objects.”
I asked @ReggieCannon15 about this moment, and how we felt to have his fans booing them and throwing objects as a result. This was his response: https://t.co/UrY8U4Ofrz pic.twitter.com/OZWaBpP1BR
— Angel Madison Franco (@angelmadison_) August 13, 2020
But Cannon, who is originally from Chicago, wasn’t finished complaining about some of the 3,000 fans who attended the game.
“I’m sorry for our fans because we had someone chanting ‘USA’ when they don’t understand what kneeling means,” he said.
“They don’t understand why we’re kneeling — they can’t see the reason, they just think we’re the ignorant ones, and it’s incredibly frustrating.”
“You can’t even have support from your own fans in your own stadium,” Cannon added. “It’s baffling to me.
“As a team we try to give the best possible product on the field, and these last six months have been absolute hell for us. Absolute hell.”
(Had to split because of twitter)
Part 2: pic.twitter.com/O4gc0ofsCH
— Angel Madison Franco (@angelmadison_) August 13, 2020
The 22-year-old signaled he knew the on-field political activism might not be warmly received.
“When we decided to kneel, I knew it was going to happen. That should tell you something. I knew we were going to have some negative pushback from having a unified response over what’s going on,” he said. “That’s the problem. That’s a problem.”
“It hurts me because I love our fans,” the anthem kneeler said.
@ReggieCannon15 why are you disgusted that people boo for the kneeling of the anthem? We are just as disgusted by you kneeling for it. Would you prefer to loose all your fans that boo at you? That would solve all your problems. https://t.co/zEimgfl4sJ
— Camille (@smiletrustme) August 13, 2020
“I love this club and I want to see the support that the league has given us — that everyone has given us — from our fans,” he added.
Ironically, the national anthem-kneeling player concluded that he and other payers in the MLS will continue to kneel for the anthem to show the world that “everyone stands together.”
MLS soccer retuned this week after the season was suspended in March due to the coronavirus pandemic, according to Bleacher Report.
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