Arsenal saw their short-lived euphoria evaporate with a 2-0 loss to Newcastle United at St. James’ Park. The Gunners headed into the second leg of the Carabao Cup semi-final on the back of a 5-1 thrashing of Manchester City. They had hope to carry that momentum to turn around the 2-0 deficit from the first leg and book a place in the final.
The Magpies, however, had other ideas. They put Mikel Arteta’s side to the sword with an excellent defensive display and capitalizing on their chances. Newcastle United captain Kieran Trippier played a key role in inspiring his side to a big win.
The 32-year-old completely neutralized Leandro Trossard’s threat. He didn’t let the Arsenal winger create a chance or have a shot on target. Trippier also worked double time to keep young Myles Lewis-Skelly at bay after seeing him score against Manchester City. Kieran wasn’t afraid of making a few rash challenges to ruin the Gunners’ momentum.
Arsenal fan and content creator Rory Cook, in particular, was absolutely riled up by Trippier’s antics. He was frustrated with how the Englishman ruined his side’s attacking moves through the left wing. At one point, Cook lost his mind in his watch along of the match.
The content creator did a watchlong of the match on his channel on BigUp, a new website that encourages watchalongs. During the game, Rory was properly annoyed by Trippier fouling Lewis-Skelly to stop him.
He went on a tirade on the England international, stating: “Kieran Trippier giving it again. Weird little rat. I’d put a significant amount of money on Kieran Trippier being a massive racist, to be honest.”
Cook faced a lot of backlash for his disrespectful jibe at the Newcastle skipper without knowing his backstory. That is because Trippier is actually the child of a black father.
His father, Chris Trippier, worked as a bricklayer in the past. Kieran has revealed in the past that his dad is of mixed race and that is why seeing his England teammates racially abuse in 2019 was particularly painful for him.
Newcastle United fans have called out Rory for his defamatory jibes on Trippier. Magpies Media, an aggregator outlet, took a jibe at him by stating: “Good morning,@Rory_Talks_Ball – would like to make you aware that Kieran Trippier is mixed race with a black father. What an absolute helmet. How can such uneducated people say things like this with such a big platform and get away with it? Bordering on defamation.”
Cook realized the mistake he had made soon after his clip started going viral. The content creator has his YouTube channel (with over 16,000 subscribers) where he analyses Arsenal matches. He also has over 240,000 followers on his TikTok and over 53,000 on X (Twitter). Moreover, Rory also works as a marketing manager for KickX, a hybrid indoor sports centre that offers indoor sports services to people.
That is why he was forced to issue a response to his mistake soon and has apologized for his actions. He admitted that throwing the word ‘racist’ on Trippier was an extremely foolish thing to do and dubbing himself a ‘hypocrite’ for doing so.
Rory also admitted in his statement that his ‘racist’ jibe would’ve been equally as ludicrous even if Trippier’s parents were both white. Cook also promised that ‘will learn from it, respect everyone for calling it out, and again offer a complete apology to Kieran.’
To his credit, the Arsenal fan is taking full responsibility in admitting his mistakes rather than hiding from the issue. But considering the mini-rivalry brewing between Newcastle United and the Gunners, the content creator will learn to be more careful with his choice of words in any future watchalongs.
