Members of the England National Rugby team have taken the knee out of “respect” for the Black Lives Matter movement.
In the England v Scotland match today, a large amount of England players and some Scottish players took the knee during the national anthem.
Many people were outraged by this, with several taking to social media to express their feelings.
#englishrugby Disappointed already. Why are our elite sportsmen still bending the knee? The England team is a wealth of diversity and inclusion, and a beacon for eradicating racism from sport. So why bend the knee for George Floyd & BLM?
Please, keep politics out of sport.— RetroNic Smythe (@RetronicSmythe) February 6, 2021
The RFU have insisted that England’s players were free to make up their own minds on ‘taking a knee’.
A RFU spokesperson has said: “The RFU supports any players’ decision and equally believes the plans off the England stage are as important in driving necessary improvement and change across all areas of our game.”
One England player, Billy Vunipola, who refused to take the knee at an earlier match, stated that his stance was linked to his Christian beliefs.
“Though I am a person of colour, I’m still more a person of Jesus,” Vunipola said in August. “What I saw in terms of that movement was not aligned with what I believe in. They were burning churches and Bibles. I can’t support that.”
