In a searing interview, the Watford striker – a keen student of black
American history – explores the sad normality of the tragic scenes in Minneapolis and his own experiences of living in a racist world
It is a simple point but one Andre Gray wants to make, lest anyone in the
United Kingdom has failed to grasp it. The marches and
protests that have swept the major cities in recent days have not only been about George Floyd, the unarmed black man who died at the hands of a white
police officer in Minneapolis on the Monday before last – or, more precisely, his left knee, when it was applied with remorseless force to the side of Floyd’s neck during an arrest.
This is not only about police brutality in the
United States, however appalling that is, however grotesque the death toll, and it is not something that is just happening over there. This is about something on our shores and, indeed, everywhere else, deeply pernicious and to listen to Gray, the Watford striker who is preparing for a return to
Premier League action the week after next, is to listen to a man trying to process a range of emotions, all of them uncomfortable.