IT'S not often that Neil Bramwell can be accused of jumping on someone else's bandwagon, but his comments last week over Liverpool striker Robbie Fowler's white line antics seem, like all the national papers, to have missed the point of the lad's actions.

It was little surprise to me when one particular Sunday newspaper sensationally blew the whole thing out of proportion, carrying a tiny mention near the foot of the story about the drugs allegations Fowler has been subjected to.

But Bramwell's coverage and comments, like the rest of the papers I've read this week, merely gave a token prominence to the background to Fowler's actions. The allegations of drug-taking which have been levelled at him are still being be made. He has already tried, unsuccessfully, to put an end to the claims by releasing a statement saying he had never used drugs.

So when Everton fans taunted Fowler during the recent Merseyside derby, the striker responded in the only way such morons understand - by rubbing their noses in defeat. Was Fowler's conduct really "repugnantly sick", as Bramwell says? Ill-considered, yes. Stupid, yes. There is a time and a place to respond to such allegations, and a sports field is not the place to do it.

But sick? I don't think so. Not when you consider the mentality of some so-called fans who stop at nothing to upset opposition fans and players. Any more sick than the Man United-haters who swoop around, arms outstretched, mocking the Munich air crash? Or the racist banana-throwing fraternity who blighted the game 15 years ago?

I just thought Bramwell, unlike other sportswriters, might have taken the time to look at the wider picture and the context to Fowler's protest, instead of jumping on the bandwagon of national media outrage.

PAUL BARRY, Blackburn (full address supplied)

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.