Racism In Soccer
Overview
Racism is becoming a
growing issue in modern day soccer. You would think that we all have moved on
and quite frankly, grown up, but it turns out that some people haven’t. Racism
is seen on all sorts of playing fields in the “beautiful game”. You see the
fans mocking players and making money noises and gestures at them. Some fans
have even gone to extremes, like bringing in a Nazi flag and holding it up
during the game. And now its not just the fans, it’s the players too. We have
seen famous players like Luis Suarez and John Terry saying racist remarks to
black players, these players are people that kids look up to. What’s a good
role model if they are depicted being a racist. Some players have also been
either suspended or banned for actually hailing as their goal celebration. Some
players just commit dirty fouls on the black players, which has happened to
Italian soccer player, Mario Balotelli.
The Fans
Where
the fans are is where most of the racism lies. Fans seem to go to some extremes
that we haven’t seen before. We have seen countless cases of fans having racist
flags and even some Nazi flags being held up at the games. This is most commonly
in Russian league games bust has popped up in a Real Madrid game as well. Four
fans were escorted out of the game for holding up a Nazi flag during one of the
teams games in 2015. Although we see things like this happening there are fans
that take their actions outside the stadium. In 2015 a group of Chelsea fans
were on the subway train when a black PSG supporter attempted to board the
train, but was shoved out numerous times by the Chelsea supporters. They then
began to chant “yeah we’re racist, yeah we’re racist, and that’s the way we
like it”. Angered by this, the Chelsea club found out who the gentlemen
involved by a video that was recorded, and the men were revoked of their season
tickets without refund. Fans from West ham made a video mocking the Chelsea
fans. In the video a black man asked if he may board the train, the white
gentlemen responded “on you come lad, this is how we do it in West ham”. This
sparked a lot of laughs and really made the situation lighter, but do not think
that all was forgotten. So the fans seem to be the most involved for the racism
in soccer.
The Players
It’s
not only the fans and supporters that are partaking in racism. There have been
many cases where the players have either make racist remarks or gestures during
a game and to the opposing players. John Terry, Chelsea’s defender, has been
tagged a racist players for saying plenty of racist remarks to black
players during games. They don’t seem to
like it, but Terry said it’s just to mess with them while we play the game, I mean
nothing. Luis Suarez has also been accused of saying a racist remark to, at the
time Manchester United’s, Patrice Evra. However the was a case where a young
player in Greece scored a goal for his club, then proceeded to the corner to
celebrate and hailed into the crowd of people. This player was Giorgos Katidis
and he was banned for life because of his celebration. This is the correct
action for me, I would have done the same to the offender, and there should be
no complaints. Mario Balotelli, and Italian, has also suffered from racism
multiple times in his career. One of the worst moments was when he was
dribbling the ball in the corner, when a player came from behind and at full
power kicks Balotelli in the back of his leg, then calls him the “n” word and
walks away. The player was red carded then later was suspended.
Player
Dani Alves said that fighting racism in soccer is a “lost cause”, what about
you?
