Thierry Henry was left stunned live on TV during a World Cup broadcast. FOX presenter Rebecca Lowe and pundit Thierry Henry were visibly shocked after panellist Alexi Lalas openly swore live on air.
Ahead of Friday's World Cup games, Lalas joined Henry, Lowe, and Zlatan Ibrahimovic at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles. During the segment, the channel aired a promotional video for James Corden's 'After Hours' show, which will be broadcast during the tournament.
Lowe attempted to invite her fellow pundits to comment, asking, 'Can we talk about James Corden for a moment?' Lalas wasted no time in expressing his thoughts on the chat show host, responding: 'Yeah, what do you guys call him? A full kit w*****, right? Or whatever it means.'
While promoting his 'After Hours' show, Corden had been pictured head-to-toe in Team USA training kit. Nevertheless, Lalas' outburst caught his fellow hosts entirely off guard, with both Lowe and Henry visibly surprised, while Zlatan muttered, 'Woah.'
Realising he may have made a mistake, Lalas frantically tried to explain his remarks. 'He's wearing that thing, he's all dressed up and ready to go,' he said of Corden.
Arsenal legend Henry, still clearly reeling from what had just been said, asked: 'Did he just say that?' Lowe attempted to defuse the awkward moment, remarking: 'Ok. Lucky we're on American television because the 'W' word on British TV, uh-uh. You've still got to visit James though, right? You've gotta go visit James Corden.'
Taking to social media, viewers were swift to ridicule Lalas' blunder. 'His reactions looks like the thumbnail on a YouTube slop AI video,' one X user wrote, while another commented: 'His co-hosts did nothing to cover it up and just totally threw him under the bus too.' A third chimed in, 'The reaction from everyone else is going to go *triple platinum* on here.'
Others insisted that Lowe, Henry, and Zlatan had overreacted, arguing that Americans do not attach the same meaning to the word. 'W***** is not used here in the states. No American watching TV would be offended by it,' one person remarked. Another queried, 'Wait you can't say w***** in the UK?'
Lalas' comments drew even greater attention to the 'FIFA World Cup on Fox After Hours With James Corden,' which airs annually in the US at midnight. Speaking about the programme at the FOX upfront presentation, Corden said: 'It's going to be me, former England soccer captain Rio Ferdinand, and one of my favorite comedians on planet Earth, Ian Karmel. Every night after the games, we're going to be trying to have a lighthearted look at the World Cup, talking about the games, talking about anything that may have happened that day. And what we're going to do is make it feel like if you couldn't be out with your friends in a bar that night, we'll be there to have some fun.'
