THE SOFT drinks company, 7Up, yesterday removed Ron Atkinson as the face of a campaign to find football’s funniest quote after his racist comments live on air.

Atkinson’s lucrative media career is in tatters as the fallout from his derogatory remarks about Marcel Desailly, the Chelsea defender, continued to spread. Atkinson has also lost his job as a sports columnist on The Guardian after resigning the previous night as an ITV football analyst. Atkinson’s off-the-air comments were made after Chelsea’s European Cup defeat to AS Monaco but were broadcast to viewers in the Middle East.

The former Manchester United manager spent yesterday offering profuse apologies and denied that he held racist views, but the damage had been done. After reviewing an ITV transcript of the comments and speaking to Atkinson, The Guardian severed its links with the 65-year-old. He had provided match analysis and columns for four years.

A spokesman for The Guardian said: “Our contract with Ron Atkinson to write a weekly football column and chalkboard has been terminated with immediate effect by mutual agreement.”

Yesterday, 7Up removed Atkinson as their frontman for their search to find the “Greatest Football Expression”. He launched the competition last week and his face appeared on the company website — until yesterday morning.

A spokesman said: “It was decided after his comments following the Monaco-Chelsea game that his picture and any reference to him be removed immediately.” The company hopes to replace Atkinson with the scandal-free Sir Bobby Robson.

However, Atkinson could make a comeback, according to Max Clifford, the PR consultant. “Ron needs five leading black Premiership stars to come out and say he has helped them play for England, they have lively banter on the training pitch but he doesn’t have a racist bone in his body,” Clifford said. “Ron is a popular figure and he can turn this round.”

Brendon Batson, deputy chief executive of the FA, who played for Atkinson at West Bromwich Albion, said that he was “very disappointed” at the comments but added: “He gave me and a lot of black players a chance when people were questioning their attitude.”

Lord Herman Ouseley, the chairman of the anti-racist football organisation, Kick It Out, said: “For someone of Ron’s stature to have revealed himself in that way reflects how far we’ve come in tackling racism but also shows how far we’ve still got to go.”

A spokesman for the Commission for Racial Equality said: “Obviously it’s disappointing that someone in a position such as his should make those comments but he has resigned — he has done the right thing.”

Atkinson said: “It was not an intentional comment, but it was an unfortunate one. Unfortunately, the feed was still on and there was a microphone on the table which picked up what I had said. I did not even know I had said it.”

Atkinson offered Desailly a personal apology and added: “I have worked with more black players, I would think, than any other manager in the country and I bet none of them has ever heard me say it to them. I put my record with the black boys against anybody.”

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