These are divisive times, but one thing we can all agree on is there aren’t enough interviews with men in their sixties talking about wokeness.

‘There’s no longer a platform for people like me’ they insist on Twitter, Good Morning Britain, the sleeve of their autobiography, their drivetime talk radio show and the posters for their nationwide speaking tour. 

The situation has become so dire that some are forced to share their thoughts with such obscure outlets as The Sunday Times, which according to Wikipedia is “a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain’s quality press market category”. If you say so!

That was the case on Sunday, when Mark ‘please be Ally McCoist and not Mark Lawrenson’ Lawrenson bravely stood up and said ‘I, a 65-year-old white bloke, have identified the reason why I’m not getting as much work as I used to and - spoiler alert - it’s nothing to do with anything I’ve done’. 

READ MORE: Heady days for the Tartan Army and more likely to come - Monday Kick-Off

Was he about to go there? Were we about to witness a man in his seventh decade fearlessly blame whatever he doesn’t like on wokeness?

Veteran pundit Lawrenson was given parole in May, 32 years after being sentenced to a lifetime of being paid well to give his opinion on elite football matches. Despite appearing to loathe the game with every fiber of his being, the man won a European Cup and five league titles with Liverpool before being forced into punditry against his will.

He appears to have made several escape attempts, most notably his decades-long ‘make withering comments and half-arsed puns rather than offering any kind of insight or enthusiasm’ protest, but it was apparently the BBC’s belated realisation that he’s an old white man which eventually led to his release. Finally, set free from the Shawshank State Prison of having to watch Kevin de Bruyne for a living. 

Asked in the Sunday Times why the BBC had liberated him from their football coverage, Lawrenson replied: “Well, I’m 65 and a white male, so, you know…”. He went on to describe himself as “anti-woke”, saying: “In all my time at the BBC, nobody ever said you can’t say this or that, but the woke thing drives me bonkers. 

“Whereas normally you would say the first thing that comes into your head, you’re now thinking ‘If I say that will I get into trouble?’. It was a bit like playing with your legs tied together”. 

Cynics might suggest that this is just the latest example of that modern phenomenon wherein old white blokes whose services are no longer required blame their obsolescence on the vague concept of wokeness, rather than looking within and asking if their own performance had anything to do with it. 

'Woke’, of course, has historically meant staying alert to racial prejudice and discrimination. Lawrenson, however, appears to have been using it in the modern sense, which means ‘thing that displeases me’. To his credit, he at least refrained from following it up with a dig at Meghan Markle. 

These same cynics might suggest that Lawrenson was effectively the Livia Soprano of football punditry, sucking the joy out of every big occasion with a sneer or weary sigh, and performatively greeting every misplaced pass with ‘Oh, I wish the lord would take me now’. 

They might even go so far as to say that, by ranting joylessly about a subject he hasn’t made enough effort to understand, he has perfectly illustrated why his services are no longer required. 

Cynics be damned. 

Maybe Lawrenson has a point. Can you actually name a single white man over the age of 60 still getting a high-profile broadcasting gig in football? I put that question to 77-year-old Sky Sports commentator Martin Tyler, 60-year-old BT Sport co-commentator Ally McCoist, 65-year-old talkSPORT host Jim White, 69-year-old Sky Sports pundit Graeme Souness, 67-year-old Soccer Saturday host Jeff Stelling and 61-year-old Match of the Day host Gary Lineker, and none of them could come up with anyone.

READ MORE: Just a point from glory...but history shows Scotland should be wary ahead of Ukraine match

In his time as a player, Mark Lawrenson scaled heights no-one reading this will ever come close to scaling. For that alone, he commands respect and his opinion when it comes to footballing matters should carry some weight. 

That’s why he spent decades being flown to the sport’s most glamorous events, and given the opportunity to share his thoughts on proceedings with millions of viewers. 

That he is no longer employed as a pundit has nothing to do with his skin colour, gender or age.

If Lawrenson hadn’t spent years making the maziest Messi runs sound as exciting as a Theresa May Ted Talk on historical changes to the packaging of Jacob’s crackers, he might still be on the BBC instead of giving the Sunday Times his best impression of Alan Partridge running out of Broadcasting House with a block of Stlton on a fork.