Football fans are not trusted to show appropriate respect to the memory of the Queen and that’s why football is the only sport to be cancelled this weekend, according to a report in Saturday’s Daily Mail.

LONDON, ENGLAND - SEPTEMBER 09: The second day of the 3rd Test match between England and South Africa is cancelled at The Kia Oval on September 09, 2022 in London, England. Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor was born in Bruton Street, Mayfair, London on 21 April 1926. She married Prince Philip in 1947 and acceded the throne of the United Kingdom and Commonwealth on 6 February 1952 after the death of her Father, King George VI. Queen Elizabeth II died at Balmoral Castle in Scotland on September 8, 2022, and is succeeded by her eldest son, King Charles III. (Photo by Mike Hewitt/Getty Images)
LONDON, ENGLAND – SEPTEMBER 09: The second day of the 3rd Test match between England and South Africa is cancelled at The Kia Oval on September 09, 2022 in London, England. Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor was born in Bruton Street, Mayfair, London on 21 April 1926. She married Prince Philip in 1947 and acceded the throne of the United Kingdom and Commonwealth on 6 February 1952 after the death of her Father, King George VI. Queen Elizabeth II died at Balmoral Castle in Scotland on September 8, 2022, and is succeeded by her eldest son, King Charles III. (Photo by Mike Hewitt/Getty Images)

When the news was announced that football, from grassroots to the Premier League and FA WSL, would not take place this weekend, we were told it was for a number of reasons.

Firstly, it was because the Queen was the patron of football in England, a role she serves for no other sport.

In addition, her grandson is the President of the FA.

Finally, football is the nation’s sport, so it is only right that it stops to pay its respect.

Of course, it would have been a far more powerful symbol to allow millions of people to gather and celebrate the life of their monarch with songs at football grounds around the country, but the decision was made to financially penalise many of those fans, instead.

Other sports like rugby and cricket will go ahead and many, rightly asked if this was a class thing.

According to the Daily Mail, it is.

They report that football feared ‘fan dissent’ and ‘global embarrassment.’

“Concern that tributes to the Queen may not have been universally respected — and the potential for global embarrassment in the event of any dissent from fans — was a factor in the decision to call off all football in the United Kingdom this weekend,” Matt Hughes wrote in Saturday’s Daily Mail.

“A number of Shamrock Rovers supporters caused outrage by singing offensive songs during their Europa conference League game against Swedish club Djurgardens on Thursday evening. And while their actions are likely to have stemmed from Irish republican sentiment, the fact that some English clubs also have politicised elements of their fan base was mentioned in the discussions over football’s shutdown.

“Several Premier League clubs appear to have implicitly recognised this danger themselves, as they opted to disable the reply function on Twitter after posting messages of condolence to the royal Family on Thursday evening.

“This was presumably an attempt to avoid inciting a backlash from antimonarchists on a forum that is not renowned for reasoned debate.”