HILARIOUS messages show how a sassy Scotswoman put down a “patronising” admirer who tried to lecture her about football.
Iona McGoughan told the man on Snapchat that she liked the sport only to suffer a severe case of “mansplaining” from Paul G.
Paul even informed Iona, from Campbeltown, Argyll and Bute, that a team consists of 11 players and three substitues.
Iona, a 23-year-old admin worker, perhaps should have known she was in for a treat when Paul introduced himself with: “Hi, hey. Hope you don’t mind me messaging you but I saw you and had to add you.
“Hey, any chance of pictures? You’ve got a cracking set by the way. What size are they if you don’t mind me asking?”
Having ignored his creepy opening remarks, but intrigued by what might follow, Iona revealed she’s a Celtic fan.
Paul responded: “I love it when women get into football.”
Bizarrely, he followed up with: “Can you name the starting 11?”
When Iona responded with “excuse me?” he mistook her rising resentment for not understanding the question and ‘mansplained’: “Aw the starting eleven is like the team that plays, eleven players and then there’s three substitutes that come on near the end.”
Iona sarcastically wrote back: “Oh really, please tell me more.”
Paul responded: “Yeah definitely, you might know some of the players like Henrik Larsson? Or we used to have like Neil Lennon and that.”
Iona deadpaned: “Wow.”
Still not picking up on the sarcasm, Paul carried on: “Yeah I’ve never been to Parkhead, but my Dad knows someone who can get us really good seats, hoping to go for my 25th, you should come with me and I’ll point the players to you.”
Iona, clearly feeling belittled at this point replied: “Aw really, do they let women into the good seats? I thought there would be a special section where we went to talk about the men and maybe cooking and cleaning.”
Still amazingly immune to Iona’s irony, Paul carried on explaining. He wrote: “No they let women in everywhere.
“Celtic are really inclusive, they even did the gay armbands today for support.”
Iona responded: “Hahahaha f*** off.”
Having been notified that Iona was taking screenshots, Paul demanded to know why.
She responded: “Just wanted to show all my girly pals that we’re allowed at the football with the big strong menfolk.”
Paul replied: “I was only trying to be nice to you and teach you about football,.
“People like you usually only use it to get men’s attention anyway.”
Sharing the exchange online, she wrote: “I think that’ll be me done with men then, can’t say I didn’t give it a good try #whyme #patronisingpaul.”
Her tweet has also received much support from those backing her case.
Jade Mullen said: “Do you know the starting 11 and then goes on to name two players not even from this decade ahahaha.”
Gary Doyle said: “I give it like four more texts before he’s incorrectly explaining the offside rule.”
Aidan Shanley commented: “He would 100% be the kind of guy that would point at Odsonne Édouard and be like ‘so that’s Moussa Dembele, Chelsea want him for like £50m.’”
Another Twitter user said: “Jesus wept! Is this guy for real? How did he get to 24 years on the planet. I have no words to describe.”
However, there were also some users which seemed to be against Iona, including woman.
One Twitter user said: “I see where he’s coming from though there’s a lot of girls who say they like the sport just to look cool or impress a guy.
“He asked you that to see if you really knew. I just don’t see why you got so offended it’s not that deep”.
Another user said: “Tbh I think your replies were really s****y and he may have a point when he says that girls sometimes say they like football just to impress.
“Plus your replies did come off as if you didn’t know about football so him naturally keeping the conversation going was to explain.”
Speaking today, Iona explained what she thought of the messages.
She said: “If this has taught me anything it has shown me that sexism is still very prevalent in football, I think in general football is considered a ‘mans’ game but I know loads of men who have no issue with women in football.
“At the moment it seems that problems which really should have been left in the past (or ideally never happened in the first place) such as sexism and racism are hugely increasing which is horrible to see.”
