Piers Morgan mocked by CNN host after criticising Simone Biles: His ‘Athletic claim to fame’ is running off set

British journalist had claimed Team USA star had ‘let down’ her team

Piers Morgan was mocked by a CNN host who said that his only “athletic claim to fame” was running off set.

Brianna Keiler tore into Morgan after he wrote that the gymnast had “let down your team-mates, your fans and your country” by leaving the team to take care of her mental health.

Biles withdrew after an unusually poor vault performance, and later admitted that she has struggled to cope with the expectations placed on her.

Keiler attacked Morgan’s op-ed in The Daily Mail, and pointed out that the athlete was “the only survivor of (Larry) Nassar’s campaign of abuse representing her Team USA.”

Then she took aim at Morgan’s own athletic credentials.

“On Twitter, Piers Morgan, whose only athletic claim to fame is that he ran off the set of his former TV show simply because another host questioned his criticism of Meghan Markle, complained, ‘Are ‘mental health issues’ now the go-to excuse for any poor performance in elite sport? What a joke. Just admit you did badly, made mistakes, and will strive to do better next time. Kids need strong role models not this nonsense.’”

And she added: “Yeah, maybe a role model like a 24-year-old who slays competition after competition and mentors the younger members of her team, who between the last Olympics and this one, came out as one of the more than 150 athletes who said publicly that they were sexually assaulted by former team doctor Larry Nassar, right under the nose of USA gymnastics.”

Keilar was hosting while CNN’s chyron on the screen read, “White male talking heads question courage of Simone Biles.”

Morgan famously walked off the set of Good Morning Britain in March when his co-host criticised his attacks on Ms Markle, following her Oprah Winfrey TV interview.

Morgan left the show in the wake of widespread criticism of his attacks.

Following Keiler’s criticism, Morgan took to Twitter to fire back at her, and said that he “had ran back, realising that quitting is cowardly.”

He also accused her of “virtue-signaling” and told her to “ask your Green Beret husband what he thinks of people who quit on their teammates in the heat of battle…”