The Bluebirds boss found the right words after an awful incident surrounding Jack Simpson and goalkeeper Rohan Luthra
Erol Bulut has voiced his disappointment over the incident which saw Jack Simpson charged for racially abusing former team-mate Rohan Luthra and believes football should be a vehicle to unite rather than divide.
Simpson this week released a message to apologise “unreservedly” for calling Luthra, of Indian descent, a “dirty P**i” during the club’s pre-season tour of Portugal in July. Full details of the incident were revealed last week when Simpson was banned for six matches and fined £8,000 by the Football Association following an investigation.
Documents revealed Simpson made the “inexplicable” comment at the breakfast table in front of several Cardiff players following a late night of drinking after a match against Porto. He left the Bluebirds in August when his contract was terminated and is yet to sign for a new club. Sign up to our daily Cardiff City newsletter to get breaking news sent straight to your inbox. You can sign up here.
Bulut partially blamed alcohol consumption for Simpson “losing control”, but wanted to ensure that his message was clear: The game should be for love and togetherness, rather than hatred and division.
I know what happened. It’s not nice,” he said. “But, as I say, if you cannot drink, you don’t have to. If you drink and you lose control, you have to control yourself. This is the problem with drinking.
It’s not nice. We do a job, in football or sport, it’s a job that connects people. Look how many people, players from other countries that we have. I am from Turkey, my staff are from Greece, Croatia, we don’t have any problems and we will never have any problems. That’s why I am proud to do this job, as a manager in football.
“In football we don’t have this. It should never happen. Because we fight together, we lose together and we win together. Everybody knows this.”
Luthra, 21, returned from his loan at Slough Town FC this week, having impressed at the sixth-tier club, owing to their new manager wanting to sign a goalkeeper permanently. Whether he will stay for the duration of the season or be loaned out again remains to be seen.
