A former international footballer launched an “extraordinary tirade” at court reporters after his teenage son was spared jail for assault.
Paul Scholes, pictured, who played for Manchester United and England, approached the press bench at Tameside Magistrates’ Court and asked journalists “what b******s are you going to write today then?” after his son Arron’s sentencing hearing.
Manchester Evening News journalist Steve Robson, who was in court, reported how Andrea Griffiths QC, defending 19-year-old Arron, had also complained about the level of media attention the case had attracted prior to the sentence being passed.
Commenting on Twitter, MEN news editor Todd Fitzgerald described Paul Scholes’ outburst as “charming.”
Paul Scholes asked reporters in court 'what b******s are you going to write today then?'. How charming. His son was about to be sentenced for attacking someone outside a pub https://t.co/Ia2otUx4Vw
— Todd Fitzgerald (@TFitzgeraldMEN) March 29, 2019
District judge Samuel Goozee gave the younger Scholes a 12-month community order, 80 hours of unpaid work and to pay costs of £775.
He had denied the offence but was found guilty following a trial.
The court heard on Friday how Arron had punched former school pal Robert Kemper, 21, at a pub in Uppermill, Oldham, on the night England played Tunisia in the World Cup last June, after there had been “simmering tensions” between the two for some time before the incident.
Both had been drinking, and Arron claimed Mr Kemper uttered an insult towards him, or one of his friends, and that he felt believed he was about to be attacked.
He was found guilty of punching Mr Kemper twice, leaving him “dazed” and with a bloodied and bruised face.
Ms Griffiths told Judge Goozee that her client is an “ordinary, decent, hard-working, studious and intelligent young man.”
She added: “The level of personal abuse that has taken place since the conclusion of this case, the pressure that this 19-year-old is under, the impact on him and his family who are thoroughly decent, the impact will be felt on them long after this court has imposed a sentence.
Judge Gozee told Arron: “I did not find this to be a protracted or sustained assault. You are a young man of good character. Alcohol clearly lessened your ability to control your emotions.”
Neither Arron of Grasscroft, Oldham, nor his father made any further comment as they left court.
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Footballers can be so charming. When I went to report on a local derby on Boxing Day years ago for a weekly a player shouted to me: “What f..ing sh.. are you going to write this week?”. I accepted it as part of the job.
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I suppose the retort to “What f..ing sh.. are you going to write this week?” would be “depends on how f..ing sh.. you lot play.”
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Ironically I didn’t know anything about this until Scholes moaned about it, cheers Paul.
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Maybe if Scholes senior hadn’t deliberately stayed in the public eye through his repeated criticism of Manchester United under Mourinho his son might not have received this attention.
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Enforcing the stereotype of footballers not being intelligent or articulate generally. Or is it just Paul Scholes?
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Is this the same Paul Scholes who never shirked from a tackle – including his own famously left hanging out during a match in which he must have thought better of wearing a decent pair of ‘boxers’ to keep his modesty in?
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Not my favourite ex-footballer and my first reaction was to think ‘here’s another of those in the football bubble who thinks the local media should act like their cheerleaders’ and to agree with much in the above comments. But on second thoughts this may simply be a case of a Dad standing up for his lad, right or wrong, and lashing out at the nearest easy target? Might’ve done it myself if the red mist came down in that moment.
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