All Things Sports

A couple of weeks ago, the dark side of football(yes it is called football) reared its ugly head once again. In a La Liga match between Valencia and Real Madrid, superstar Vinicius Jr. was the victim of racial abuse from Valencia fans. The abuse was so bad that Real Madrid manager Carlo Ancelotti had to convince his star to continue playing. I wish I could say that this incident is isolated but it is not. Racism in the Beautiful Game has been a problem for years. From Bukayo Saka, Marcus Rashford and Jadon Sancho facing abuse following the Euro 2020 final to Romelu Lukaku facing monkey chants from his own supporters, racism is a disease that continues to infect the sport. There have been attempts to fight it however with the most notable being the Premier League’s No Room for Racism campaign. Although that specific campaign has had some success in England, other countries, like Spain and Italy, have seen less improvement. The best evidence is what occurred recently with Vinicius Jr. 

What allows this issue to continue? It starts with FIFA, an organization known for its stellar conduct. While FIFA has handled this issue better in recent times, their punishment in the past for racist actions was lackluster at best. It wasn’t until around 2019 that the punishment doled out by FIFA met the gravity of the issue that they faced. The lack of proper action for years has allowed racism to have a lifeline when it really shouldn’t. The recent discipline, which included a partial stadium closure and fine for Valencia, has not stamped out racism because it has festered in the sport for far too long. It is going to continue to be a problem for a while because of this. 

But what can we do? Racism is something that needs to be dealt with and it needs to be dealt with quickly. Well any preventative measure, such as preventing certain fans from entering, seems both unethical and unfeasible. The only measures that can be taken are counteractive, such as the ones already being taken in response to the incidents we have already seen. We must continue to ban the fans and punish the teams for these kinds of actions because this sport is about the players. In fact we must take harsher action in order to fully eradicate the disease that is plaguing the beautiful game. Authorities have already considered increasing the punishment to include longer bans, points deductions for the teams, and expulsion from tournaments and competitions. As much as authorities do, this will only be truly successful if the players step in as well. For example, when Juventus player Moise Kean(who is part Ivorian) was the subject of racial abuse, his teammate and star defender Leonardo Bonucci said that the blame was “50-50” and that Kean could have acted better when celebrating a goal. That is not a recipe for success. When you are the subject of abuse would you want your leader and friend to come out and say it is your fault you are being abused? He essentially threw his teammate under the bus and silenced his suffering. How is racism supposed to stop if fans feel validated by players like Bonucci who put the blame on the victim? Thankfully, Bonucci’s case is more of an isolated one than the norm and an overwhelming majority of players spoke out in support of Moise Kean, but the damage was done. The fans felt validated. If the fans are going to stop, the players they idolize so much are going to play a role in it. They must come out and be vocal about this. They must continue to support their teammates and condemn those who think that it is okay to shout abuse at a player.  The players hold the most amount of power and they must use their power for good. 

Incidents like what happened a few weeks ago with Vinicius Jr. will continue to happen in the future, but their frequency can be reduced to none if the sport takes the right actions. The players must speak out and the authorities must use punishments to send their messages. Racism can never be tolerated, especially in a sport famously dubbed “The Beautiful Game”.