Frankie Francis and former Sunderland player Danny Collins were joined by current Black Cats attacker Chris Maguire on the latest edition of the SAFC Unfiltered podcast and Maguire spent some time talking about the reaction to an image that surfaced last December which showed him and Aiden McGeady eating in McDonald’s.
Maguire and McGeady were pictured eating in McDonald’s after a League One loss to Gillingham back in December and after the image featuring the two players was shared on social media by @RokerReport, it drew the ire of many Black Cats fans.
As per ChronicleLive, Sunderland manager Phil Parkinson declared that the two players were “not professional” for visiting the fast-food establishment.
However, the Black Cats boss did defend Maguire after this image of him and McGeady surfaced on social media, saying: “To be fair to Chrissy, in the last three weeks he’s been doing extra training every single day. He’s losing weight, he’s getting himself fitter, which he needs to do, and he’s buying into what we’re asking him to do. I’m pleased with that.”
Maguire discussed this image showing him and McGeady in McDonald’s and the fan reaction to it during his recent appearance on the SAFC Unfiltered podcast, saying: “That McDonald’s thing got blown way out of proportion. You know what it’s like on buses.
“We had a long trip away to Gillingham. I can understand fans weren’t happy we lost that game. As players, we weren’t happy because, no disrespect, we should be going to places like that and turning teams over.
“We were on a six-and-a-half-hour bus journey, the full team’s stopped at a service station. Manager, staff, everybody’s there, you get off, there’s a coffee shop, boys have McDonald’s, boys have KFC, whatever.
“The funny thing is, whoever took the picture decided to take one of me and McGeady, where we’re just sat, whereas they didn’t turn the camera around and show all the players.”
Was this incident blown out of proportion?
YES
NO
TIF Thoughts…
As they are professional footballers, it may be understandable why Black Cats fans were not particularly pleased by the image of Maguire and McGeady in McDonald’s, however, if it is true that the image failed to show that plenty of other Sunderland players were in McDonald’s as well, then it may have been quite harsh on Maguire and McGeady that they were singled out.