Gary Lineker has been stood down from Saturday's edition of BBC's Match of the Day football highlights show.
Lineker, employed as a freelancer by the BBC, had been critical of the Government's new policy for asylum seekers and the BBC released a statement on Friday saying the former Tottenham Hotspur striker had broken its guidelines on social media use. The 62 year-old Leicester native, the 1986 World Cup golden boot winner with England, made reference on Twitter to 1930s Germany in criticising the language in the Conservative government's plan for people who arrive in the country on small boats on the south coast.
Lineker has been Match of the Day's host since 1999 and Saturday's edition of the show, which will broadcast highlights of Leicester City vs Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur vs Nottingham Forest among others, is due to begin at 10:20pm. Former Arsenal and Crystal Palace striker Ian Wright, a regular pundit on MOTD, is also set to be absent having tweeted his support for Lineker.
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"Everybody knows what Match of the Day means to me, but I’ve told the BBC I won’t be doing it tomorrow," Wright said. "Solidarity." In a statement, the BBC said that Lineker will remain off air until both parties have reached an agreement on his use of social media.
"The BBC has been in extensive discussions with Gary and his team in recent days," The BBC said. "We have said we consider his recent social media activity to be a breach of our guidelines.
"The BBC has decided that he will step back from presenting Match of the Day until we've got an agreed and clear position on his use of social media. "When it comes to leading our football and sports coverage, Gary is second to none.
"We have never said that Gary should be an opinion free zone, or that he can't have a view on issues that matter to him but we have said that he should keep well away from taking sides on party political issues or political controversies."
As far as replacements are concerned, Mark Chapman presents the programme's Sunday show so he is a likely option while Football Focus presenter Alex Scott could be drafted in too.
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