Arsenal Fans vs. Manchester City's Emmanuel Adebayor: Hypocrisy at Its Finest

Taunts about paedophilia, death in the family, sexuality, Munich...and then the fans go boo-hoo if someone gives it back. This was the subheading of a brilliant column by Martin Samuel in the Daily Mail.

It refers to Emmanuel Adebayor, infamously running 90 yards across the pitch to celebrate in front the Arsenal fans that last season gave him so much stick, after he scored the third goal for Manchester City in their 4-2 home win over Arsenal.

Much has been made of Adebayor's actions, but not much at all about the Arsenal fans.

We all saw their reaction to Adebayor's celebration, and yet nobody has kicked up a fuss about them, even though in the matchday programme for that game, it clearly states:

"PLEASE note that foul, abusive or racist language will not be tolerated. We take such cases very seriously and use CCTV cameras to investigate, as well as employing undercover staff to identify culprits."

"Anyone found guilty of such behaviour will be ejected from the stadium. If you are offended by bad language, please inform a steward."

Foul language. Abusive language. Racist language. All seemed to be used towards Adebayor from the Arsenal fans throughout the entire match, yet we haven't heard anything about any fans being punished, have we?

The headline for Martin Samuel's superb column in the Daily Mail reads: "You Hypocrites in the Stands".

It's a brilliant article in which argues quite rightly why it's not just Adebayor at fault. Here is the first part of it:

"According to a significant percentage of the Arsenal supporters who travelled north to Manchester on Saturday, the mother of Emmanuel Adebayor, the Manchester City striker, is a prostitute, while his father is employed as a menial labourer washing elephants.

"Were we to assert this as fact in a national newspaper we would, rightly, be sued."

"Were a person to repeat it, one on one, in a threatening and aggressive manner to the young, fit and muscular 6'3'' west African, who is currently English football's Public Enemy No. 1, the result may well be a good thump, which some courts would accept was provoked. So you cannot have it all ways."

"The Arsenal fans who sang the Adebayor song at Eastlands on Saturday, the one that insulted his father and called his mother a whore—and there seems to be disagreement over where it came from, but check calls were made to some Gunners fans in the top tier and they certainly heard it—have already been allowed to go far beyond what would be considered reasonable behaviour in any other domain."

"And so they had to put up with getting just the tiniest bit back when the player they had taunted for the best part of two hours, including pre-match and the warm-up, achieved the point of the game and scored the goal that made Arsenal's defeat a certainty. He ran the length of the field and slid on his knees in front of them, arms spread wide in triumph. Oh dear. Boo hoo! How terrible that must have been."

"Adebayor did not curse, he did not spit, he certainly did not launch the missile that split open the head of a steward."

"He did not wade into the crowd and start throwing right-handers. Just came to rest with a smug look on his face that milked every last moment of his part in Manchester City's victory, and revelled in Arsenal's miserable journey home."

"In the circumstances, it was hardly the greatest outrage."

Of course, there are no excuses for Adebayor's behaviour, and Martin Samuel continues: "This does not excuse Adebayor because what he did was unprofessional. Football is a team sport and players are handsomely rewarded to think, always, of the team first. Adebayor must have known there would be repercussions if he was seen to respond to the provocation of Arsenal's fans, and these would be harmful to his team."

There have a lot of articles here on Bleacher Report recently talking about hypocrisy and how Barcelona and Real Madrid are hypocrites, e.g. "FC Barcelona: Hypocrisy at it's Finest."

But if you want a true definition of hypocrisy, just watch those TV pictures showing Arsenal fans at the City of Manchester Stadium when Adebayor celebrated his goal in front of them.

Now that really is hypocrisy at it's finest.