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Phoenix Rising FC Season Opener Against San Diego Loyal Seeks to Make Amends and Find a Fresh Start
By Dirk Smith, M.Sc, SDL (He/Him)
Last season when the Phoenix Rising Football Club went up against the San Diego Loyal, the match ended up with San Diego forfeiting after a Rising player made a gay slur against openly gay player Colin Martin. The homophobic player, Junior Flemings, has since been dumped by Phoneix and manager Rick Shantz was suspended for mishandling the incident during the match, despite Loyal coach, Landon Donovan voicing his concern.
Since that day, Rising RF General Manager, Bobby Dulle sought out to make changes to his organization so that such an incident would not occur again. This included inclusivity training and partnerships with LGBTQ+ organizations, including the You Can Play project and Phoenix Gay Flag Football League.
What to watch this weekend
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People are like “where’s the weekend open thread?” And Jeremiah’s like “who can write this?” And I’m like all I have is enough to time to re-organize the house a third time during the pandemic, and watch D&D livestreams, and apply for jobs, so I guess I’ll do it.
And then I asked myself what soccer outside of Sounders, OL Reign, and Tacoma Defiance is actually worth watching. That question is a lot harder to answer. In order to figure out what to watch around the American soccer landscape you have to know how your own teams are doing; they’re the cool teams. The other teams aren’t cool.
A 25-year-old talent of Rose Lavelle’s calibre should not be sitting on the bench. And yet, week in and week out, this World Cup-winning Ballon d’Or nominee continues to not see significant minutes for Manchester City. Since 71 | Rose Lavelle
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Leading sports bodies will begin an 84-hour boycott of social media on Friday by stepping up their demands for companies such as Facebook and Twitter to do more to stop online abuse being sent or seen. Sports bodies to boycott social media for bank holiday weekend over abuse | Sport | The Guardian
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On Friday, the USL Championship will have its first nationally televised match of the new 2021 season on ESPN2’s airwaves. The hosts, Phoenix Rising, will break in their new stadium at Wild Horse Pass as they look to replicate last year’s Western Conference title.
The visiting San Diego Loyal, however, makes the matchup about more than just 90 minutes of soccer.
The last time these two teams faced off was also San Diego’s final regular season game. In it, now-former Phoenix attacker Junior Flemmings directed a homophobic slur at Loyal midfielder Collin Martin the only openly gay active professional in men’s team sports. What followed ended up becoming one of the most widely discussed moments in the USL’s 2020 season.
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