Fresh from their powerful and exciting run in the FIFA World Cup in South Africa, the German national football team has been shocked by an anti-gay slur on the team by the agent of injured captain Michael Ballack.
Michael Becker, who is an agent and advisor to Ballack since 1999, made the anti gay remarks in a magazine two months before the FIFA Competition.
Der Spiegel writer Alexander Osang recalled an interview he did with Becker before the tournament in which the agent allegedly told him the players were a bunch of gays and the writer claims Becker was going to out them saying which of the top players were gay and also making a reference to one who was "half gay."
Becker later told a group of players and managers there was a former national player who was going to expose a "bunch of gays" within the national team.
The whole issue of gay players in the German national Bundesliga is a rather sensitive issue in Germany at the moment. During March this year, former football manager Rudi Assauer caused outrage by saying there is ‘no place' for gay players in football. He said "Perhaps they are OK in other sports but not in football. If a player came to me and said he was gay I would say to him: 'You have shown courage.' But then I would tell him to find something else to do" He continued "That's because those who out themselves always end up busted by it, ridiculed by their fellow players and by people in the stands"
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