Sportsmail, the online sports section of the British tabloid newspaper Daily Mail, has revealed another ‘hippy crack’ storm surrounding Aston Villa and England youth international Jack Grealish. Our feelings concerning this issue can be nicely summarized by this Villa supporters poll:
Birmingham will be okay. Photo: @VillaBible | Twitter
Grealish is 21. He had a party at his Birmingham hotel on Saturday and the police were called. “The noise was incredible. There were huge numbers of people inside the room and it was lawless,” proclaimed one bewildered source who was apparently witnessing his or her first party.
With regards to the ‘hippy crack’, “sources close to Grealish” admit that balloons were present at the party but Grealish wasn't involved. That's right, balloons at a party. Someone call Scotland Yard.
Unfortunately for Grealish, this story is triggered by his past actions: he once got drunk, on holiday, at the Spanish tourist destination island of Tenerife. It was horrific.
In 2015, he was also captured inhaling some of that ‘hippy crack’. ‘Hippy crack’, contrary to what you might believe, isn’t tie dye shirts, hula hooping, forming a drum circle or freebasing kale.
It’s inhaling nitrous oxide, commonly referred to as laughing gas, by means of a balloon. Sorry to disappoint you.
If the allegations are true, it’s just strange that a player who was on a £20,000-a-week contract before signing an improved deal earlier this month chooses ‘hippy crack’ as his preferred party favor. But everybody’s got their something.
Grealish has been great for a Villa side that has otherwise struggled following their relegation to the Championship. It’s obvious that he needs to choose his friends more carefully as these kinds of stories, however misrepresentative they are, do damage.
But the facts are fictitiously distorted. Even calling nitrous oxide ‘hippy crack’ is a strange adjustment that smacks of embellishment.
Making a mountain out of a molehill is a tabloid speciality. If you were at a concert, bar, party or any social gathering this weekend, chances are something went down that you wouldn't like to be associated with on the front page of a newspaper. For a young, prominent footballer, that's the harsh reality.
The Daily Mail is trumpeting a scare story at the expense of a young man who’s actions as a 21-year-old don’t necessitate a public apology or the scorn of complete strangers.
Follow me on Twitter: @ConmanFleming
