Premier League English

Crystal Palace star insists taking the knee before games is ‘degrading’ and urges fellow black players to ‘stand tall now’

Crystal Palace’s Wilfried Zaha has vowed to stop taking the knee before matches as he believes the gesture has lost its meaning and is now a form of degradation.

The 28-year-old forward believes taking the knee to show support for racial equality since Project Restart is becoming ‘something we just do now’ and several clubs, including Brentford last weekend, have stopped making the gesture.

Speaking at Thursday’s Financial Times’ Business of Football summit, Zaha said:

‘I’ve said before that I feel like taking the knee is degrading and stuff because growing up my parents just let me know that I should be proud to be black no matter what and I feel like we should just stand tall.

‘Trying to get the meaning behind it, it’s becoming something that we just do now and that’s not enough for me.

‘I’m not going to take the knee, I’m not going to wear Black Lives Matter on the back of my shirt because it feels like it’s a target. We’re trying to say that we’re equal but we’re isolating ourselves with these things that aren’t even working anyway, so that’s my stand on it.

‘I feel like we should stand tall. Now I don’t really tend to speak on racism and stuff like that because I’m not here just to tick boxes. Unless action is going to happen, don’t speak to me about it.’

Zaha spoke on the day Arsenal chief, Vinai Venkatesham, branded racist abuse on social media ‘the biggest problem in football’ after striker Eddie Nketiah became the latest high-profile player to be targeted.

Nketiah was urged to leave Arsenal in a racist post replying to a training picture he posted on Twitter ahead of last night’s clash against Benfica.