Yes, it’s going to be one hell of a final. At least that is the hope when the English three Lions and the Spanish La Roja meet in Berlin tonight. Spain may commentators are saying was the nest team so far while the English team stumbled along the way most of its performances not convincing. But they have made it so far and that’s what counts initially. If it was only about skills and actual performance seeing the German team eliminated was one sign of life really beg unfair. Hey this is the stand of many commentators, and indeed they were good.
But then Euro 2024 hasn’t been only about football skills and the chants and shocks the games create among the capacity crowds. This time around politics and racism seem to have cast some shadow on the tournament. The Germans indeed seem to have done superb organization only had their team at least reached the final! But in the run-up to the whole thing with only a few days remaining there were some not so nice incidents. According to some poll it was said 20% of respondents prefer more ‘white players’ in the national team.
Note that the team has that many non-white players. But this fact shows politics especially far right politics which is slowly engulfing much of Europe is marring the sport followed by perhaps hundreds of millions even billions, and that is sad. In the same poll it’ said 17% of respondents found it upsetting that the team captain, Ilkay Gundogan, is of Turkish origin. You see where things seem to be going!
Coming to England’s, for the black players of ‘The Three Lions’ life has not always been good. Despite four years having elapsed football enthusiasts can’t forget the outrage that happened after the Italians won the trophy the game having gone into penalty kick. The blacks Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka missed the penalties and things got ugly. The torrent of racist abuse on the social media against the three was so wicked and devilish it was hard to not feel sad for them. Even within the mainstream media which by and large has never been up for the gold or any medal of fair and unbiased reporting joined in. They even tried to draw parallels mentioning that the two penalty scorers were white, Harry Kane, and Harry McGuire. Could you be any more blasphemously crude!
One media wrote “Parts of British social media became an ugly, twisted place, filled with vile messages of abuse and senselessness direct towards those three players.”
There was one recent ugly event in the warm up to Euro 2024. Several days ago Stadium, England lost 1-0 to Iceland in a friendly at Wembley. Fans not happy with the team’s performance boo. In that game Saka was brought on as a substitute in the 65th minute of the match, well after the winning goal had been scored, according to reports. The young man didn’t make much impact. What happened was even though he played only for about twenty minutes reports say, “Yet the next morning, it was Saka’s image that several mainstream media outlets selected to illustrate the loss, accompanied by sensational headlines, including one that read “Black Ice.” Isn’t that telling!
This time there’s no Rashford, no Sancho it is only Saka. His smile that lit the entire world after he scored the penalty spoke volumes.
Ivan Toney’s words said it all; “I’m a confident person. If I score, I score. If I miss, I miss. We have to step up and you have to have the courage to take a penalty. What will be, will be. For those who racially abuse a player for missing a penalty or doing something wrong, more fool them.” Isn’t one hell of a confident guy? If you have watched how smoothly and confidently he took the penalty you’d know this guy really means business.
With the far right threatening to sweep French politics in the recent elections French players were in fighting mode telling the French people to turn their backs to Le Pen and co. Kylian Mbappé who has been vilified by the woman herself and the right’s poster boy Jordan Bardella tells the young people of France, “The extremes are knocking on the door of power”.
In the quarter finals penalty shootout against the Swiss Cole Palmer, Jude Bellingham, Saka, Ivan Toney and Trent Alexander-Arnold scored. And the three lions made it to the semi-finals. And Rio Ferdinand asks; “Where are the racists now?” by the way Cole Palmer one of the most promising English players is of Caribbean heritage. Got it! Also, when Saka scored the penalty his smile spoke lots of volumes. “I’m so proud of this guy!” Sancho wrote; “You did it for me and Marcus brother!”
The Spaniards who have been most of the time impressive have their own racism problems in the La Liga. One player without whom the La Liga games wouldn’t have been what they are comes to mind; Vinícius Junior. According to reports the amount of racism this gifted player who could perform magic with the ball is horrendous. But despite all that he keeps up. Carlo Ancelotti is quoted as saying,
“La Liga has a racism problem; they cannot yell ‘monkey’ at Vinícius. The game must be stopped. If an entire stadium is chanting ‘monkey’ then the game has to be stopped.”
Look it is becoming clearer now that in European clubs and most national teams if black players score goals and play good they are footballers, but if their performances aren’t below par and most importantly, if they miss scoring chances then they’re blacks. It’s difficult to imagine in these times of knowledge and IT people regress to gone, forgotten and for all practical purposes primitive ages. Because racism is primitive and as its Stone Age mentality it should have been left where it should have stayed and mankind should keep on moving. Any person with racist and tribalism inclinations in this age must be a throw over of past ages. It’s as simple as that.
We crave for the times when we will be able to say, “It’s only football dummy!”
The Ethiopian herald July 14/2024