Sacked referee David Coote comes out as gay and addresses leaked videos

David Coote, the former Premier League referee has acknowledged that his struggles with his sexuality played a role in the “really poor choices” leading to his job loss last year, ‘The Guardian’ reports.

The 42-year-old was dismissed by the Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL) following the appearance of several leaked videos online. In one of them, Coote insulted former Liverpool manager Jürgen Klopp, and in another, he was seen snorting a white powder.

In his first interview since the scandal with the Sun newspaper, Coote provided some personal context to the situation, without disputing many of the accusations. “I’ve had issues around my self-esteem – and that relates to my sexuality. I’m gay and I’ve struggled with feeling proud of being ‘me’ over a long period of time,” he said.

Coote reflected on the shame he felt during his teenage years, revealing, “I didn’t come out to my parents until I was 21. I didn’t come out to my friends until I was 25. My sexuality isn’t the only reason that led me to be in that position. But I’m not telling an authentic story if I don’t say that I’m gay, and that I’ve had real struggles dealing with hiding that.”

“I hid my emotions as a young ref and I hid my sexuality as well – a good quality as a referee but a terrible quality as a human being. And that’s led me to a whole course of behaviours,” he explained.

Coote also cited fear of facing abuse related to his sexuality in the football world as another reason for not coming out sooner. “I have received deeply unpleasant abuse during my career as a ref and to add my sexuality to that would have been really difficult,” he admitted.

The pressures of high-level refereeing compounded his stress, and Coote turned to drugs as a form of escape. “It’s not something I was reliant on day by day, week by week, month by month,” he clarified.

“I’ve had long periods where I’ve not used it – but it was one of the escape routes I had. Just getting away from the stresses, the relentlessness of the job. It fills me with a huge sense of shame to say that I took that route.”

Regarding the cocaine video, Coote acknowledged, “I don’t recognize myself in the cocaine video,” confirming that the substance he snorted was indeed cocaine during his time working as a VAR official at the European Championship last summer.

“I can’t resonate with how I felt then, but that was me. I was struggling with the schedule and there was no opportunity to stop. And so I found myself in that position – escaping.”

Coote remains firm in denying allegations of an arrangement with a friend to issue a yellow card to a player during a match, which is currently under investigation by the FA.

“There was no agreement prior to the game. I went and did my job. The player committed a yellow card tackle,” Coote stated.

“I received nothing for it,” he added. “I’m really disappointed that anything like this has come out because it tarnishes the integrity of the game. And whatever people think of me as a referee, as a human I have always gone out and done my best on the pitch.”