FORMER Sunderland AFC ace Aiden McGeady has slammed Netflix over their famous documentary series about the club.
Former Celtic starlet McGeady was part of the Sunderland team that was the focus of Netflix’s Sunderland ‘Til I Die series, which has two seasons so far, from 2018-2020.
The fly-on-the-wall documentary followed the Tyne and Wear club as they began life in the Championship, having been relegated from the Premier League the season prior.
The series was well-received by viewers as it showcased the chaos of two different owners and back-to-back relegations for the Black Cats throughout both seasons.
However, McGeady, 37, who is now plying his trade at Ayr United, spoke out last month on the Christie Scanlon Podcast, slamming the series for its “invasive” cameras and the edits that were made.
Video shows a clip from the documentary as McGeady walks out to the training pitch, where some of the youth team decide to launch a barrage of snowballs at him.
McGeady smiles, dodging the incoming projectiles as he goads them: “Embarrassing. Gimps. Little girls. Embarrassing.”
The clip then cuts to McGeady telling podcast host Christie: “The first season of the documentary on Netflix, there was a lot of cutting and clipping and editing and putting things in at certain times when it suited them to fit the story that they wanted to paint.”
The 83-capped Irish international then discussed the second series which followed the side in League One.
He continued: “It wasn’t as invasive as the first one, the first one was cameras in the treatment room, cameras in the dressing room, cameras everywhere on the training ground.
“They were picking up every single thing that people are saying and we were like ‘Well there’s a lot that goes on at a football club that shouldn’t really see the light of day’.
“There’s a lot of things that are said that shouldn’t be public knowledge as well.
“I’ve seen it all, I’ve seen all the episodes, I think. They showed us the first episode as a team but they’d already edited it so we had no say whatsoever in what they were going to put out.
“There’s nothing you can do about it now, but a lot of players were unhappy with the amount of time that they probably gave to the company that made it.
“Players were getting asked to go and do an interview every single day and so many of those interviews never even made the documentary.
“A lot of players were actually like ‘I’ve done about ten interviews and they never even made the documentary’, so players were a bit unhappy with how much time they’d given up for it as well.
“At the end of the day I don’t even think Sunderland actually made any money off it.”
The podcast clip was uploaded to social media on Friday with the caption: “Aiden McGeady | The truth behind the Netflix documentary.”
The video has since received over 8,700 likes and dozens of comments from users who seemed to be divided over McGeady’s opinion.
One user joked: “Could they edit him to have a smile.”
Another commented: “Netflix paid Sunderland for all-access, they can use whatever they want. That’s the game.”
A third replied to this saying: “The club apparently aren’t paid mate. It’s all just to raise the profile of the club.”
Another user said: “Did the documentary show the McGeady turn?”
A fifth wrote: “He’s basically saying he’s spat the dummy because he didn’t get much time on the documentary, no one wants to see that mug.”
A third and final series of Sunderland ‘Til I Die – which will focus on the team’s promotion play-off win to end the documentary on a high – has been confirmed but no release date has been announced yet.
