Melissa Reddy is a South African-born football journalist who has been linked to Senegalese player, Sadio Mané. Melissa is specialized in reporting about the Premier League and also works with the online newspaper ‘The Independent’.
As a journalist, she has presented programs as well as been guests at various others. She was the first to feature as a football analyst on SuperSport’s marquee shows titled ‘Backpages’ and ‘Monday Night Football’. Melissa also has TV appearances in Sky Sports News and the BBC’s Premier League Show.
Her link with the Senegalese professional football player is said to have a romantic undertone as she has been referred to as the athlete’s girlfriend. However, they both share something deep in common; Premier League Club, Liverpool. Ms. Reddy has huge love and support for the League club and Mané currently plays for the club.
10 Facts About Melissa Reddy You Should Know
1. Brief Intro Of Who The Football Journalist Is
She was born on the 24th of August 1986 and hails from Johannesburg, South Africa. Her family was all sports lovers with her late parents supporting Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur. Her parents even tried to influence her to join in supporting either team.
Young Ms. Reddy grew up loving sports as well and went on to play football and crickets. As a child, she also loved Rugby which is a well-known sport in South Africa.
Upon graduating from college, Melissa attended the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg where she studied Media and Communications. While interning at a business channel in S.A known as ‘Summit TV’, she was encouraged to pick up sports journalism and become a professional at it. This was the bane of the young South African’s journey to her successful career in sports journalism.
2. Melissa Reddy Developed A Huge Interest In Sports From A Tender Age
The young South African journalist whose love for sports started from an early age tells how insatiable she has always been regarding her passion. She admitted to always wanting to be involved in sports media and speaking about sports from her teenage days.
Further emphasizing how much she was invested in sports, Melissa was self-taught on all the rules and codes of different sports. Her main interests at the time were football, rugby, cricket, wrestling, and boxing. Reddy also participated in all types of sporting activities like volleyball, netball, and even football. She was a football left winger and captain at a point in her life.
On her love for journalism, she began to practice a long time ago as well, recruiting her family members to analyze and discuss different sports with her at her imaginary sports show. It was as a result of this unwavering passion that she strived so hard to be where she is at the moment.
3. Her Love For Liverpool FC Started A Long Time Ago
Melissa Reddy’s love for the Premier League club, Liverpool dates as far back as when she began to groom her love for sports. Though her parents supported different clubs at the time, she found herself in love with Liverpool.
She believes that she did not pick the club to love but that the club picked her. In her words ‘there was an instant attraction and sense of belonging’ which she felt with the club.
Her earliest memory of the club is from the 1990s FA Cup and she remembers falling in love with Robbie Fowler after an impressive game from him and the club. She is also an ardent follower of the happenings in the club and has her downsides in her years of supporting the Premier League club.
4. As An Editor, She Has Written For A Couple Of Newspapers
Melissa moved to Cape Town after her internship in Summit TV and in 2007 and landed a job with TEAMtalk Media. The media company used to be a Sports media house known as 365 Media Group but are now dormant.
Moving on, she has written for ‘The Athletic’ website as well as JOE, a distributed social media publisher owned by Maximum Media.
5. Melissa Is The First Female To Hold Key Positions As A Journalist
37 year-old Melissa was named Head of Football in TEAMtalk Media company by 2011 and after, she moved to Africa’s largest sports publication ‘KICK OFF Magazine’. At KICK OFF Magazine, Ms. Reddy was named Deputy Editor and was the first female to hold such a title. Upon joining The Independent, she was also named ‘Senior Football Correspondent’ in November of 2019.
6. She Is An Author
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The football journalist apart from writing and publishing for media houses and websites has also written a book. Melissa is the author of the book titled ‘Believe Us: How Jurgen Klopp Transformed Liverpool Into Title Winners.’
This book was released in 2020 and was even referenced by Eddie Jones the head coach of England’s national Rugby Union team.
7. Reddy Suffered Racism and Sexism In Her Career
Just as it is in some parts of the world where people of color suffer different forms of racial abuse and segregation, Reddy wasn’t left out. You’d think growing up in South Africa with the apartheid would ensure she has a thick skin but this is never the case.
She has been put down so many times because of her gender and color. Melissa stated that she had to suffer the challenges of being a foreigner in the English industry. There were accusations of her, a colored woman, wanting to dominate in an industry she wasn’t fit to be in.
All these she was made to endure but she pulled through and has been steadily rising in her career.
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8. She Disputed The Claims That AFCON Would Be Postponed
Premier League team, Liverpool were really hopeful that the rumors making rounds about the postponement of the Afcon 2021 tournament would turn out true. This is due to their unwillingness to lose some of their best players to their national teams during the tournament.
However, Melissa Reddy dealt the team a huge blow when she disputed the postponement of the tournament. She stated that the games would definitely hold and that CAF was adamant about carrying on with its plans.
In the wake of this, Liverpool would lose players like Sadio Mané and Mo’ Salah to name a few, to the tournament being held in Cameroon.
9. Is Reddy’s Relationship With Mané Public Knowledge?
The relationship status between Mané and Reddy has been speculated for the most part of it. Many sites have put out the news as an allegation and very little proof is out in public to confirm the news.
If they are actually dating and together, they are doing a pretty good job keeping it out of the public eye and enjoying their relationship in private.
10. She Has A Podcast
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Mané’s rumored girlfriend is the host of a podcast titled ‘Between The Lines With Melissa Reddy’. The podcast aims at revealing all questions fans may have to ask and she has top names in the football scene as guests. The topics brought up and discussed by Ms. Reddy and her guests are mostly topics of interest to fans and they also include behind-the-scenes information about clubs, players, and coaches.
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