Down the years, several black players have been subjected to racial treatment of different kinds. One of such was Rudi Voller and Frank Rikaard’s confrontation in one of the world cup games in Italian 90. Another eye catching incidence was samuel Eto’s abuse from fans during a game that he had to live the pitch before the end of a high profile football game diring his time in Barcelona.
Equality groups like kick it out and BAME (black Asia and minority ethnic) amongst other have come up with sustained measure to stamp out racism but as years come and go, the act remains evergreen in the game.
MEDIA ROLE
Recently, Raheem Sterling and Kalidou Koulibaly of Napoli were at the receiving end of the evil vile.
After the match against Chelsea in Stamford bridge where he was racially abused by four fans who were given stadium bans by Chelsea football club, Raheem Sterling accused the media of fueling racism in the manner they portrayed black players in contrast to their white counterparts.
• In one of his post, he cited the story about Foden being framed positively, but Adarabioyo’s article appeared negative.
He wrote “You have two young players starting out [their] careers, both play for the same team, both have done the right thing. Which is buy a new house for their mothers who have put in a lot of time and love into helping them get where they are, but look at how the newspapers get their message across for the young black player and then for the young white player.
Sterling, who himself has been a subject of negative press coverage since 2016 when England shamefully exited the euros, said it’s totally unacceptable.
This young black kid is looked at in a bad light “which helps fuel racism and aggressive behaviour”
I think he is not far from the truth because some media stories have succeeded in making their subjects labelled as hate figures in the society due to negative post frame-ups. The media should concentrate more efforts on campaign against racism, rather than fueling it with negative stories.
Football Federations are equally not helping matters.
During Napoli’s match with Inter Milan, the referee (mr Mazzoleni )was asked to suspend the game due to racist abuses from Inter fans but he refused, koulibaly was subsequently sent off during the game for clapping at the referee.
The club appealed against a two-match ban but was rejected by FIGC and the player missed the games against Lazio and Bologna.
That is a real question mark on how federations are treating the cases of racism in football.
There was no atom of support for the player even though the body responded that they understood what he went through and that he wasn’t alone in the situation and yet suspends the young lad.
There should have been better ways to handle the case in a manner that passes a good message to the public. I personally feel that the Italian federation should have used this avenue to campaign against this devilish act. The decision didn’t go well with Napoli and that’s why the club released a statement that read:
“The decision of the FIGC appeals court to turn down our appeal against Koulibaly’s ban is a sad defeat both for football and the wider issue raised by this whole affair, namely, the fight against discrimination of all sorts, which is still part of football and society.
“A battle that UEFA has been fighting for years – and which Napoli has always supported – has thus been degraded.”Rarely in Italy have we witnessed such unanimous condemnation from society as a whole.
And rightly so, by FIFA rules and standards, matches should be called off when a players are subjected to persistent racial abuses from the fans during a game. I felt the Italian federation should have put this in perspective when taking the decision to reject such appeal.
ARE THE PUNISHMENT SEVERE ENOUGH?
Merely suspending a player for some games is not enough to stamp out racism among footballers. This is another area that is poorly addressed by football federations .
During a premier league game, Patrice Evra was racially abused by Luiz Suarez who only served a 12 game suspension as punishment.
Federations must help when it comes to severity of punishments. Obvious offenders like Suarez should be banned from the game seasonally and not for few games. If footballers are aware that a racial abuse can cause them two years suspension, it will help to eradicate the act from the beautiful game.
HOW DOES IT AFFECT THE FANS?
If poor treatment of cases and negative information about racism is wrongly seen as a norm by the fans, It can eat deep into the game and it’s not as if the present situation of racism among fans is pleasant to the ear.
A global study revealed that more than half of football fans have witnessed racist abuse at matches.
kick it out(an equality organisation) through which the survey’s results were released shows the views of up to 27,000 fans from 38 footballing countries, Most of them said they personally witnessed racist abuse on match days.
How seriously will these salient issues be addressed by the media and football federations?
Only time will tell.
Football Chronicles 