Montreal Canadiens' hire of non-French-speaking Randy Cunneyworth irks Quebec official - ESPN

[Laurence Horn]

On Dec 19, 2011, at 11:15 PM, Alice Faber wrote:

> On 12/19/11 6:15 PM, Victor Steinbok wrote:
>> I thought this might be a language issue when the hiring was first
>> announced, but I did not want to mention it if it was just a curiosity.
>> Well, it looks like we are past mere curiosity.
>>
>> http://goo.gl/NmR7E
>>> The Quebec government isn't pleased about the hiring of a Montreal
>>> Canadiens coach who can't speak French.
>>> The province's culture minister says she expects the Habs to correct
>>> the situation.
>>> Christine St-Pierre isn't quite calling for the firing of new coach
>>> Randy Cunneyworth, who was just hired over the weekend.
>>> But she says the Habs have given the impression his hiring is
>>> temporary, and she takes them at their word. The former NHL forward's
>>> title is interim coach.
>>> The hiring has created a frenzy of media reaction, including calls for
>>> a boycott of products associated with the Canadiens.
>>> But judging from the reaction on social-networking sites, the response
>>> of regular Montreal fans may be slightly less critical.
>>
>> Cunneyworth is Canadian, born in Toronto. Montreal last had a
>> non-French-speaking coach in 1971.
>>
>
> As a sidelight to this, all of the sports talk and blog discussion of
> this refers to Cunneyworth as unilingual rather than monolingual.
>
>
Better unilingual than unlingual.  Of course hockey is more likely to leave one toothless than tongueless.

LH

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