The Al Fayed documentary

Thursday’s revelations about Mohamed Al Fayed revealed in the BBC documentary and podcast ‘Al-Fayed: Predator at Harrods‘ have been utterly shocking and sickening to hear about.

Whilst we had all heard rumours about Al Fayed over the years and it felt inevitable after his death that one or two stories might emerge, this level of sickening behaviour that is being described is far beyond what I ever thought would transpire.

Of course, the only thing that really matters at this point in time are the victims who have bravely accounted the horrific crimes that they endured. The wording of the article that the BBC released indicated that there could be many more that come forward and that this could be the tip of the iceberg in terms of this story.

If you haven’t watched the documentary yet then I would recommend doing so. It is a distressing watch, but also an essential one – it not only explains the horrific witness testimony but also how complaints were made whilst he was alive, but intense intimidation and legal pressures prevented any charges being made against Al Fayed’s name.

In a country where only 3% of rapes ever result in a conviction, it’s hardly surprising that victims only feel comfortable coming forward when the fear of repercussion in any form has subsided. Especially when many victims were employed by Al Fayed.

So far, thankfully, there have been no reported links to Fulham Football Club, but this afternoon – they made this statement.

We are deeply troubled and concerned to learn of the disturbing reports following yesterday’s documentary. We have sincere empathy for the women who have shared their experiences.

We are in the process of establishing whether anyone at the Club is, or has been, affected. Should any person wish to share information or experiences relating to these allegations, we encourage them to contact the Club, at [email protected], or the police.

Naturally, the question has arisen about Mohamed Al Fayed and the feeling towards him from the Fulham fanbase. If you’ve ever been to an FFC game, you’ll know that there are two prominent songs that feature his name. The one about “he wants to be a Brit” and “Take Me Home”.

As I’m writing this I do understand that in the grand scheme of what’s been uncovered this week, writing about whether or not we should sing a football chant feels incredibly insignificant and puerile.

However, the conversation is already rife and in all honesty, it was one of the things I thought about fairly soon after seeing the news. It’s hard not to, these chants are in-built into our weekly habit – and as we know old habits die hard.

I am not one for trying to tell anyone what to do – I am in no way in a position to do so, and in all honesty who is? We all have autonomy to do or say pretty much whatever we want to. Sometimes that will have a consequence, often it won’t.

All I know is that I won’t be singing his name again and to be honest, that’s not a difficult decision for me. I have sung both in the past plenty of times, but mostly because they’re good chants, not because of any huge sense of loyalty to somebody who owned our football team over a decade ago.

Given that Al Fayed will never be convicted, we all have to make our own minds up. After watching that documentary, I personally couldn’t even dream of glorifying him in any way any more.

I would love it if we could find a way of reworking “Take Me Home” given that, in my opinion, the chant was never really about Al Fayed anyway. It’s a chant about Fulham’s spiritual home of Craven Cottage and what makes us unique. His name was just something that fitted at the time of it’s creation in the late 00s.

“Take Me Home, Stevenage Road” works pretty well in my book, and is similar to what Manchester United fans (United Road) and Oxford United fans (London Road) sing.

But I do know that chants aren’t started, altered or stopped on a website blog – and quite often the best ideas start spontaneously in pubs, on trains and on concourses.

I must admit to feeling a sense of guilt at how over the years I have been part of the collective blind eye turning to the Mohamed Al Fayed grapevine rumours. Nobody, except those directly associated, could have known the full extent of the horrors that have been outlined, but still that word on the street was an inconvenient truth. I guess that’s why sport-washing works – that description doesn’t always need to be attached to an oil-rich gulf state.