When Andrew Bascome embraced Rastafarianism in the late 1980s, it was the beginning of a healing period that would not reach maturity until Monday morning.

We may never know what inspired the man to utter the three words that changed a run-of-the-mill press conference about fundraising into a contender for news story of the year.

But the jaw-dropping “I was molested” revelation should resonate today through every breakfast table, every school hall, every boardroom, every meeting room and every sports club for some time to come.

Maceo Dill, for so long ostracised for his steadfast advocacy of children’s rights in sports clubs and associations, is to be applauded for lifting the lid on sexual abuse in football.

Andrew Bascome, in tear-jerking manner, then allowed us to look inside that box of secrets — and it ain’t pretty.

To achieve what he has in football, while keeping inside for more than 40 years something so soul-destroying as what he endured, is truly sensational.

Modern society may not appreciate fully the context of the Andrew Bascome story when all they see is a greying Rasta who is notable for the long headdress that keeps his dreadlocks out of public view and who is better than “quite good” as a football coach.

But this was Bermuda’s most truly gifted footballer of the Seventies and early Eighties, a darling of the midfield for North Village Community Club and the national team, and a near-certainty for life as a full-time professional had he been born 30 years later.

Unfortunately, and unbeknown to those of us who oohed and aahed at his every silky touch, Bascome had been victimised all along the way as he sauntered in one-touch fashion from the under-14 and under-16 age groups straight into the senior team at Village without giving the under-18s a second glance.

From the moment he made his first-team debut at Southampton Oval against Southampton Rangers, Bascome, with instructions to take only one touch to protect against defensive enforcers because of his slight build, became a fan favourite.

And what his progression did was foster a qualified belief that North Village had a youth programme that was second to none in Bermuda.

On the field, spectacular, but off it there are now only question marks, should what has now come into the public domain be only the tip of the iceberg.

World football has been in pain since the Fifa bribery scandal engulfed those at the very top of the game, but sexual abuse, as exposed in England by Andy Woodward, takes us to a place that should never again be visited.

But before we depart, all must be revealed and action must be taken.

On November 16, Woodward told The Guardian newspaper that he had been sexually abused while a player at Crewe Alexandra, a lower-league club in the North West of England. That set off a chain of events in which 83 suspects have been identified and almost 100 clubs involved, including four in the Premier League.

The parallel that Crewe have with North Village is that they, too, were seen as a talent factory, with many of their youth graduates going on to have successful careers at the top flight and international level — David Platt, Robbie Savage, Neil Lennon, Danny Murphy and Dean Ashton being among the most notable.

Dario Gradi, whose tenure as manager of a club rarely seen outside the third and fourth tiers of English football was rivalled for longevity by only Sir Alex Ferguson at Manchester United, was suspended this week by the Football Association as investigations continue into his time as assistant manager at Chelsea in the Seventies.

Not only is he accused of “smoothing over” a 15-year-old’s claims of abuse but he is said to have known of the unhealthy predilection for young boys of Barry Bennell, a 62-year-old coach whose past has followed him on both sides of the Atlantic and caught up to the extent that he is due in South Cheshire Magistrates’ Court today to face charges of sexual abuse of a boy under 14 between 1981 and 1985.

It is with this backdrop in mind that it is unconscionable how some local commentators could cast negative aspersions on the priority given to Bascome’s revelations over the initial purpose of the press conference on Monday:

“I wish people would watch all of the interview and get what it was about”, said one in a vain attempt presumably to shift the focus to fundraising and the Bascomes’ laudable attempts to help children through football.

“It was a poor headline”, said another.

Picture the sight of “journalists” poring through the employment ads 24 hours after having returned from a press conference with news only of a football group’s ambition to raise $250,000, while “I was molested” was reduced to a throwaway line, if included at all.

It is this kind of burying of heads in the sand that have allowed sexual abuse — of men and women — to become the taboo subject it is in this country.

We feel uncomfortable about it, so let’s not talk about it and then hope it goes away.

Andrew Bascome has ensured that it will not go away. His bravery, and that, too, of younger brother David — read nothing into their contrasting levels of visible emotion, for the pain is just as real — is commendable and an example in humility that is so rarely seen.

We wait now for those in position of authority — the Bermuda Police Service, the Bermuda Football Association — to make an action plan that can assist in unearthing whatever other skeletons are out there while protecting the rights of the vulnerable.

This would be the appropriate first step in taking on the baton from Andrew Bascome.

He has suffered enough.