Racism and Football

Racism and football seem to now be closer than they ever have been before.Racism has become an ever present issue in the world of football. More and more footballers are now being subjected to racist abuse just for playing for a different club or scoring a goal. How can these people have the audacity to say that they are a football fan, when they cannot appreciate that the player is just doing what he gets paid for. A true football fan is able to see that every player has the right to do his job without being subjected to this disgusting abuse that so called fans throw at them.

Racism has seemed to grow in football throughout the years. There have been many campaigns to try to stop racism in football, such as they Y Word campaign. These campaigns have seemed to have little effect on the problem, as we have now seen a rise in the number of players that have been reportedly racially abused by fans. Here are few example of when this has happened.

The first example of this and for me one of the worst cases is when a chant was made up by a certain group of fans, sung to Tottenham fans. This chant included the words “We pay Hitler’s gas bill” and “You’re off to Auschwitz”. This is so appalling that it prompted calls for a police investigation and fans to be banned. This chant relates to the fact that Tottenham is in a Jewish populated area. This chant was so disgraceful that it was included in the Y Word campaign. The Y Word campaign was created to bring awareness that the word ‘Yid’ was not a term for Tottenham fans it was in fact a derogatory term for Jewish people. This campaign highlighted that the world of football was not in fact clear of racism it was only choosing to hide the fact that racism in football still existed throughout football even at the highest levels. 

Y Word campaign YouTube video. Please take a look at it and understand the message it sends out.

The second example of racism in football is the Luis Suarez and Patrice Evra incident between Liverpool and Manchester United on the 15th. It was alleged and later proven that Luis Suarez had racially abused Evra during the game and Suarez was subsequently fined £40,000 and banned for 8 games by the FA. Suarez later stated that he did use the term “negro” but did not mean it to cause any harm. This however highlighted to not only the premier league but to the world that football had not at all battled the case of racism, it had indeed turned a blind eye to the fact that players had not been at all educated on racism or the lasting effect racism has on a player. Suarez later only made things worse by refusing to shake Evra’s hand when the two sides met again in the league. The league has since started funding projects that aim to educate people on the effect on racism; however this incident will be ever present in debates about players not knowing enough about racism.

In the recent past more and more players have moved abroad and with that more and more players have experienced racist abuse from both rival fans and their own fans. A prime example of this would be Mario Ballotelli, who throughout his career has suffered at the hands of racists. This was most evident when he was at AC Milan and received abuse from not only away fans but also home fans. Another time this happened is when he was playing for Italy and was racially abused by fans. This showed that prior to the thought that only opposition fans abused players, now it seem that all fans abused players not matter what team they played for.

They are of course many more examples of racism in football but these examples highlight just how naive the world of football actually is. It is time now that footballs governing bodies stood up and did more to put a stop to this abuse.

Article contributed by:  Matthew Clark

Twitter: @mattclarky199