Ethnicity and football

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Ethnicity and football is a description of the global acceptance of the sport of Association Football, with players from many different races and countries participating. While football has moved around the world from its roots in England during the 18th century, the progress of non-European players has sometimes been hindered, with racism a continuing problem in many different countries.

People of different races have sometimes not been accepted as players in European football. This has changed in recent times, due to societal change as well as campaigning on the part of the football authorities in different countries. UEFA and the European Union support the Football Against Racism in Europe (FARE) project which aims to stop racism.

1 Early football (1880-1960)
2 Modern football (1960 onwards)
3 Ethnicity in Australian football
4 Religion and football
5 'Asian' Footballers
6 See also
7 References
8 External links

[edit] Early football (1880-1960)

In several countries, black players were often harassed by spectators; stories of players being pelted with racial slurs, chants, and even bananas were quite commonplace, in spite of the fact that there had been black players playing in Europe since the early days of football.

Andrew Watson, an amateur player, was capped for Scotland three times in the early 1880s, and played in the Scottish Cup for Queen's Park.^[1] Arthur Wharton, who played for Preston North End and Sheffield United, amongst others, is recognised as the world's first black professional footballer^[2]. Jack Leslie was the first black player to be selected for England, but never actually played for his country - a fact which is thought to be due to the colour of his skin.

Frank Soo was the first (and so far only) ethnic Chinese person to play for England, during the Second World War, though these were not official internationals. Other non-white footballers in Britain in the early 20th century included John Parris, a black Welsh international; Abdul Salim, an Indian playing for Celtic; Tewfik Abdullah, an Egyptian who played for Derby County; the Jamaican Lindy Delapenha, who won a title with Portsmouth before moving to Middlesbrough; his countryman Gil Heron, who played for Celtic; and Charlie Williams, a British black defender for Doncaster Rovers who later became a successful entertainer.

[edit] Modern football (1960 onwards)

It was not until Viv Anderson that black footballers started to become accepted into the England national football team.^[3]. Since then, many black players have played for England team, and several have serve as captain, notably Paul Ince, John Barnes and Sol Campbell.

Nowadays in the bigger leagues minority players have become part of football, and are supported. This was seen in the French football team which won the 1998 World Cup. The team was composed of white and black Frenchmen, plus a New Caledonian (Christian Karembeu); the whites also included an ethnic Armenian and Kalmyk (Youri Djorkaeff), a Basque (Bixente Lizarazu), and an ethnic Berber (Zinedine Zidane). This composition was seen as an indicator of racial harmony.

Unfortunately, in countries that do not otherwise have many immigrants of different race (such as many Eastern European countries), prejudice against hiring e.g. black football players still remains an issue, especially in the smaller clubs. This can be particularly distasteful when combined with a lack of decency shown by some football fans when they chant against the opposing team.

Incidents in 2004 have also shown this to be the case in some bigger leagues, where there are a visible number of players from a different ethnicity. A notable incident occurred that year when England played Spain in Madrid, and home fans were heard by the world media to be making "monkey chants" at some of the black players on the pitch ^[1], forcing the Spanish football authorities to apologise for their fans ^[2]. Part of the outcry about these recent incidents was put down to cultural differences between the English-speaking (mainly British) press and Spanish culture ^[3].

On November 27, 2005 Marc Zoro, a player from the Ivory Coast, was playing for the Italian team Messina when he was racially abused by Inter Milan fans to the extent that he picked up the ball and threatened to leave the field ^[4] ^[5]. This caused the Italian football authorities to propose to start the following week's matches late after an anti-racism display ^[6]. This comes at the same time that European Union legislators are threatening Europe-wide legal sanctions against national football associations and clubs whose fans are seen to take part in racist actions. ^[7]

[edit] Ethnicity in Australian football

Ethnics set up the old National Soccer League, which lasted from 1977 to 2004 as Australia's top-flight competition, however clubs such as South Melbourne, Sydney Olympic, Sydney United, Adelaide City and Marconi could only draw fans from the ethnic group which they originated from. Names such as "Hellas", "Croatia" and "Juventus" were removed from clubs in an attempt to draw new supporters from outside of these ethnic groups but after falling crowd attendances and financial difficulties caused the NSL to fold. 18 months later, the A-League was launched with no clubs having ethnic ties, and several teams, such as Melbourne Victory and Central Coast Mariners were newly created. Almost all of the old NSL powerhouses are now dominating their respective state leagues.

[edit] Religion and football

Sometimes certain clubs are, often unfairly or unnecessarily, connected with religions, such as both Spurs and Ajax with Judaism, or the Old Firm Rangers F.C. and Celtic F.C. of Glasgow, who are seen to be Protestant and Catholic respectively. This has led to problems with violence and occasionally death, but often equates to little more than derogatory nicknames.

[edit] 'Asian' Footballers

Players of Asian origin have a long tradition - often forgotten - in European football. Hong Y 'Frank' Soo played 9 times for England during the 2nd World War. Sammy Chung managed Wolverhampton Wanderers to a UEFA Cup Final in the 1970s. Vikash Dhorasoo, of Indo-Mauritian descent, played for the French national team during the 2006 FIFA World Cup. South Korean Park Ji-Sung who plays at Manchester United is an excellent example of Asian footballer who can be a rising star in big clubs in Europe. Park may be preceded by the Japanese player Hidetoshi Nakata, who played at various European clubs such as Perugia, AS Roma, Parma, Bologna, Fiorentina and lately at Bolton Wanderers. Another Japanese player, Shunsuke Nakamura, overcame criticism of his lack of pace and stamina, and helped seal Celtic FC's 2006-2007 Scottish Premier League season title. Other Korean, Iranian, Chinese and Japanese football players have also gained starting places in their respective clubs in Europe. Some football clubs hire the Asian football stars hoping to increase merchandise sales from the player's respective Asian country. However in Britain in 2007, there have still been complaints of a lack of Asian participants in top league football ^[4].