Former Premier League referee Mark Halsey claims David Coote’s sexuality was an open secret among his colleagues and says the 42-year-old deserves a second chance.
Coote was sacked by the Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL) in December after a video emerged of him using disparaging language towards Liverpool and the club’s former manager Jurgen Klopp.
He is still under investigation from UEFA after a second clip showed him snorting cocaine while working at last summer’s European Championship.
EXCLUSIVE Referee David Coote opens up on his sexuality
Watch the full interview here: https://t.co/zRryEInsXz pic.twitter.com/OXAJJfzc9x
— The Sun (@TheSun) January 28, 2025
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Coote admits to poor choices
Coote issued an apology to The Sun last night in which he admitted to struggles with being gay meant he was not “in a great place” and had led to some “really poor choices”.
He said: “My sexuality isn’t the only reason that led me to be in that position. But I’m not telling an authentic story if I don’t say that I’m gay and that I’ve had real struggles with hiding that.
“I hid my emotions as a young ref and I hid my sexuality as well – a good quality as a referee but a terrible quality as a human being. And that’s led me to a whole course of behaviours.”
On the video that saw him calling Klopp a c***, he said: “I recognise that they [his remarks] fell well short of standards that are expected of a top-level referee and I deeply regret saying what I said. The comments are not reflective of my views of any of the individuals concerned or my wider views in general.”
Coote has also been accused of discussing with a friend the potential for showing a yellow card to Leeds’ Ezgjan Alioski prior to a game against West Brom in 2019.
However, he insisted: “There was no agreement prior to the game. I went and did my job. The player committed a yellow-card tackle. I received nothing for it.
“I’m really disappointed that anything like this has come out because it tarnishes the integrity of the game. And whatever people think of me as a referee, as a human I have always gone out and done my best on the pitch.
“I wasn’t in a great place, and I was messaging people that in hindsight I shouldn’t have trusted. I was naive. [I] made some really poor choices and I really wish I could turn back the clock now and do things differently.”
He’s taking responsibility – Halsey
Halsey, who retired from refereeing in 2013 after a 14-year Premier League career, said Coote’s honesty should be recognised.
He told BBC Radio 5 Live: “Coming out and taking full responsibility for his actions, he’s not making excuses, he’s taking full responsibility.
“He’s a human being, we all make mistakes in life. Everybody makes mistakes in life and they deserve a second chance and nobody should go through what David is going through. I really, really feel for him. When the referees get together, we’ve all said things about players or managers.”
Coote has received threats online and Halsey said he could sympathise after also suffering at the hands of trolls during his career.
“He’s made some mistakes and he doesn’t deserve the death threats,” he added. “I’ve had death threats before against my family, my wife who was battling leukemia. They wanted to see us dead with the cancer coming back. Some of the things they wanted to do to my young daughter was just horrendous.”
‘We all knew about David’s sexuality’
Asked what the reaction would have been had Coote come out as gay while he was still refereeing, Halsey said: “It would have been very tough. It shouldn’t be like this. We all knew [fellow referees] about David’s sexuality. That didn’t bother us. He was a human being, he was a nice person, so what about his sexuality. So what? It’s all about sharing love and understanding people and what they are going through.
“Society today, it stinks and it’s good that David has got his friends and family to show him the love and the companionship that he needs to get him through this. I hope that the PGMOL are helping him through this.”
