AN interest in antiques, art, and a preference for The Guardian as opposed to The Sun has led to married father-of-two Graeme Le Saux having his sexuality questioned throughout his career, especially by Robbie Fowler.

With so many taunts and rumours doing the rounds old Graeme became somewhat sensitive to any jibes of that nature with opposing players used to their advantage. On this day in 1995 Le Saux decided to show his teammate David Batty that he was a hard man by punching him after they had a coming together when going for the same ball in a Champions League match away at Spartak Moscow.

It has long been assumed that Batty must have been taunting Le Saux about his sexuality but in his autobiography Le Saux refutes this, and says it was more to do with arguments over passing the ball and the general ill-feeling that starts to creep in when a team loses it’s form.

Le Saux said: “It was a horrible atmosphere in Moscow. It was bitterly cold, the pitch was frozen and the dressing-rooms were miserable. I felt weighed down by a general air of anxiety even before kick-off. They scored early and things felt fraught, as though they were unravelling. Everything was going from bad to worse.

“It was still the first half when I set off after a loose ball. I was running up the touchline, the ball in front of me. I was going to intercept it. David was coming across the pitch to try to get there as well. We arrived at the same time and ran into each other.

“I hit the deck and, as I got up, he came at me very aggressively. He was being threatening and screaming things. His face was contorted with anger, as if he was going to rip my head off. Hitting him was more of a pre-emptive strike than anything. If I had not hit him, I felt he was going to hit me.

“It is a myth that he was hurling a stream of homophobic abuse. It wasn’t the words that got to me, but a combination of four or five things. I was upset at what he said and that he was accusing me of being selfish again; I was upset that we were not doing well as a team and I reacted because of the way he behaved.”

Despite being the puncher, Le Saux seemed to come off worse than Batty with the former having a broken hand to show for his troubles, and the latter seemingly unaffected. Le Saux said: “I swung at him, connected and knew immediately that I had broken my left hand. I am not a fighter. I hadn’t closed my fist properly. I was in a lot of pain, which just made me feel more ridiculous.”

Tim Sherwood had to come and separate them and manager Ray Harford tore the proverbial strip off them at half time while Le Saux was having his hand bandaged. The reigning champions of England lost 3-0.

Le Saux continued: “There has always been speculation about what David said to me. Most have assumed that a homophobic taunt made me snap. But I never considered this incident similar to the one with Robbie Fowler, nor even in the same league. What David said was between me and him. I am not condoning it, but I am not condoning what I did, either.

“The aftermath was appalling. We were miles away from home, we had been battered 3-0, I had a broken hand and I had just hit my own teammate. I sat by myself on the coach to the airport, cowering at the back.

“More than anything, that night is the one thing I wish I could erase from my career.”

The incident epitomised the ill-fated Champions League campaign for the team which would never hit the heights of the previous season again. Batty and Le Saux were both picked for Rovers’ next match, a 0-0 draw at Highbury, with Le Saux sporting a cast on his hand - a little souvenir from his trip to Moscow.

Such team fighting was not seen again in English football until Kieron Dyer and Lee Bowyer went at it while playing for Newcastle in 4004. In the absence of any footage of the Batty/Le Saux indicent, watch Dyer and Bowyer using their handbags below, and check this to see what full time sefl-publicist and part time football club chairman Simon Jordan was up to on this day in 2001.

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