Football is a game of fine margins. Usually, those margins involve a VAR line or a late tackle. But for David Coote, the margin between a top-tier career and a complete public collapse was a 96-second video and a very loose tongue. If you've followed the Premier League at all over the last few years, you know the name. You probably have an opinion on him, too. Most of them aren't great.
Honestly, the story of Premier League referee David Coote isn't just about a bad day at the office. It’s a spectacular, slow-motion car crash of a career that basically nuked the reputation of English officiating in one fell swoop. We aren't just talking about a missed penalty or a soft red card. We’re talking about a level of unprofessionalism that most people didn't even think was possible at the elite level.
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The Video That Changed Everything
It all started on a random Monday in November 2024. A video leaked. In it, Coote is sitting on a sofa, looking—let's be real—a bit worse for wear. He’s asked about Liverpool. "Liverpool were shit," he says. Then comes the kicker. He calls former manager Jürgen Klopp a "German cunt" and "fucking arrogant."
The internet exploded.
At first, there was some chatter that it might be a deepfake. People wanted to believe it wasn't real because the implications were too massive. If a sitting Premier League official is on tape calling a manager those names, how can he ever be trusted to be neutral? Coote initially "vehemently denied" it was him. Then, a few hours later, he admitted it. He just said he didn't remember it.
The PGMOL (Professional Game Match Officials Limited) didn't wait around. They suspended him immediately. By December 2024, he was sacked. His position was "untenable." No surprise there. You can’t exactly go to Anfield and blow the whistle after calling the locals "bellends."
A History of Friction with Liverpool
To understand why this was such a nuclear event, you have to look at Coote’s history. He wasn't exactly a fan favorite on Merseyside before the video.
- The 2020 Merseyside Derby: This is the big one. Jordan Pickford’s lunge on Virgil van Dijk. It ended Van Dijk’s season. Coote was on VAR. He didn't even look at it for a red card because he was too busy checking for a marginal offside. Klopp was livid.
- The Odegaard Handball: December 2023. Martin Odegaard basically plays basketball in the box against Liverpool. No penalty given. Howard Webb later had to come out and admit Coote (on VAR) and the on-field ref got it wrong.
- The Burnley Game: 2020. This is the game Coote actually references in the leaked video. Klopp confronted him on the pitch after a 1-1 draw.
When the video dropped, it felt like a "smoking gun" for every conspiracy theorist who thought officials had it out for certain clubs. It didn't just ruin Coote; it made every other referee’s job ten times harder.
It Got Much Worse
If the Klopp comments were the end of it, maybe he’d be a footnote. But the "fall from grace" kept falling. Shortly after the first video, a second one emerged. It allegedly showed Coote snorting a white powder through a rolled-up banknote. The timing? During Euro 2024, while he was working for UEFA.
UEFA didn't mess about. They banned him until June 30, 2026.
Then, in early 2025, Coote did a "tell-all" interview where he came out as gay. He explained that a lifelong struggle to hide his sexuality and the mental strain of the job led to "really poor choices." It was a moment of humanization in a very ugly story, but the legal system wasn't done with him.
The Final Blow: Nottingham Crown Court
The most shocking part of the Premier League referee David Coote saga didn't even happen on a football pitch. It happened in January 2026 at Nottingham Crown Court.
Police had seized Coote’s devices during the investigation into his conduct. What they found on his laptop was a Category A video—the most serious kind—of a 15-year-old boy in a school uniform.
Coote pleaded guilty.
On January 8, 2026, Judge Nirmal Shant sentenced him to nine months in prison, suspended for two years. The judge told him he had a "spectacular fall from grace." His lawyer argued he was struggling with cocaine use and mental health at the time he downloaded the video back in 2020.
He’s now a former official with a criminal record, a 150-hour unpaid work order, and a reputation that is, quite frankly, beyond repair.
What This Means for the Game
So, what do we actually learn from all this?
First, the "transparency" era of refereeing is probably going to get a lot stricter. PGMOL is already under massive pressure to show that their refs aren't biased. The Coote situation is the ultimate nightmare scenario for them.
Second, the vetting process for officials is clearly going to change. How does a guy with these kinds of things on his personal devices and these kinds of opinions stay in the Select Group for eight years?
If you're looking for the "takeaway," it's probably that the human element of refereeing is much messier than we like to admit. We want them to be robots. They aren't. They have lives, they have vices, and sometimes, they have deep-seated biases.
Next Steps for Fans and Analysts:
- Monitor PGMOL Policy Changes: Expect new social media and lifestyle conduct clauses in referee contracts.
- Review Past Decisions: While the FA cleared Coote of "match-fixing" allegations regarding a yellow card incident in 2019, his past games are being scrutinized by analysts for patterns of bias.
- Watch the UEFA Ban: His ban lasts until mid-2026, but with a criminal conviction now on his record, it is virtually impossible he will ever return to any level of organized football officiating.