How have Liverpool fans received John W. Henry’s apology about ESL involvement?

Red Sox and Liverpool owner John Henry (Photo by Maddie Meyer/Getty Images)
Red Sox and Liverpool owner John Henry (Photo by Maddie Meyer/Getty Images)

Liverpool fans had some mixed reactions to their club’s owner, John W. Henry’s video apology. On what side of the fence do you stand following ESL uproar?

On Tuesday night it was a damn good night for all fans in the football hemisphere. The idea of the European Super League was abandoned and looks as if it will remain just that for the time being.

Since the turn of events where nine of the 12 founding clubs have pulled out, there has just been an outcry of “FSG OUT”, “Glazars Out”, “Kroenke Out” by the fans of these respective English clubs.

Fans waited all day for their individual owners to come out and give them insight on what is going on and why they have agreed to such a whacked idea of a competition and were ultimately waiting for their clubs to withdraw.


Manchester City led the way, while Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester United and Spurs, all jumped on the bandwagon. Thankfully, no English club that were believed to be founding members are involved at the moment.

Liverpool’s boss then went one better and stopped hiding behind closed doors. The fans were outraged he let the players and the manager Jurgen Klopp walk into a room filled with gunmen firing rapidly away at them while not wearing bulletproof vests.

They were hit hard with criticism; people, fans, and other teams – all giving them an evil side-eye and a word or two about their involvement in the proposed Super League – and the Liverpool boys had to do it without any warning of what’s coming their way over next couple of days.

The Reds’ squad stood tall and united against their own employer, which sequentially left their boss no choice but to pull out of the ESL and issue an apology to them, the fans, and the manager.

How did the Liverpool fans accept this apology?

I have to say… Far better than expected. Reading all their replies and all the humour added in some of their responses, one has to believe the Red army are just jovial that their club no longer forms part of the ESL.

The funniest of them all; are the Liverpool fans saying they will only forgive their owners if they back Klopp with a £200m transfer kitty or a surprise summer signing of Kylian Mbappe and/or other top stars in the game today.

In my opinion, it took a lot for him to come out and issue an explanation. Him not informing his club or the fans before the announcement that the Super League’s planning is in motion was wrong from the get-go.

Here is a couple of reactions from the Liverpool fans to his public apology;

In the next tweet, this tweeter made sure he got everything off his chest in the limited 280 characters allowed per tweet.

One of my favourites of Wednesday afternoon.

Any decision made in this world we live in will never be 100% backed, nor will an apology be fully accepted by all. There are alwasy 50/50 splits and some are still FSG out and others FSG in.

I feel he meant it from the bottom of his heart but in the same breath, I still believe the repair job will not happen overnight and will take a lot of sucking up before the relationship between him and the fans will be fully mended.

And in saying this, I’m not exactly sure it will ever be the same again – and if John W. Henry will ever be able to set foot inside Anfield one day in the future and feel loved by the fans.