The storm surrounding Senad Lulic and Antonio Rudiger is another sorry incident and something has to be done
For genuine reasons, Italian football doesn’t have the best reputation for being free of racism although progress has slowly been made and explicit incidents are widely criticised when they do occur. Kevin-Prince Boateng was supported worldwide after he kicked the ball at fans subjecting him to abuse while just in 1989 Udinese reneged on their deal to sign Ronnie Rosenthal after a campaign of anti-semitic intimidation and the club was later sanctioned for breaching discrimination laws.
Therefore, the latest row surrounding Senad Lulic’s insulting comments directed at Antonio Rudiger aren’t a welcome distraction. Enough has been said about unsavoury scenes involving supporters but those involving the players themselves are arguably worse as they should be held to a higher standard in their interaction with fellow professionals when they’re at work .
Rudiger’s teammate Radja Nainggolan posted a simple message of ‘No To Racism’ in response while former Juventus defender Nicola Legrottaglie penned a short opinion piece criticising the Bianconcelesti player for disrespecting an opponent. Lulic’s comments that the black Germany international was in some way a jumped-up street vendor which he initially refused to take back were unacceptable for somebody in his position.
Footballers rarely openly mock one another considering all the media training they receive in the arts of being diplomatic. Lulic’s comments were made in the heat of a 2-0 derby defeat which is a mitigating factor but it was poor form from him not to apologise and leave it to Lazio to do it on his behalf before he eventually showed remorse on the Monday after.
This has all played out before as when Rudiger’s Roma teammate Daniele De Rossi apologised for abusing Mario Mandzukic after playing Juventus by disparagingly calling him a gypsy. Famously, in 2000 Sinisa Mihajlovic and Patrick Vieira fell out publicly with both seemingly having said things they shouldn’t to one another when Lazio played Arsenal. They later became good friends at Inter showing that their offensive comments weren’t necessarily genuine manifestations of racist feeling. Yet, all of these controversies continue to blight the image of Italian football and especially when it’s the protagonists such as the players or former managerial icons like Arrigo Sacchi who say something stupid.
In 2014, the current Atalanta player on loan from Napoli Alberto Grassi called an opponent a ‘vu’cumpra’ when playing for the Bergamo side against Hellas Verona’s Primavera. A ‘vu’cumpra’ is the pidgin Italian for African migrants who sell on the streets so it’s equivalent to what Lulic said about Rudiger. The similarity between the comments also show how the not insignificant number of people claiming that the comments were not racist are wrong.
Both Salifu Alimeyaw and Rudiger were clearly being insulted for their race. He was banned for 10 matches according to the code of ethics implemented in 2013 and Lulic could face the same. Automatic bans for this sort of thing are the only solution. The Premier League had the same controversy surrounding Luis Suarez and Patrice Evra and the English FA enacted a severe punishment to set an example. Italy must do the same. You can’t swear at a referee, you can’t say something racist. There’s a common code of decency. These players who say stupid racist things in the heat of the moment probably aren’t racists but such punishment is an easy way to protect the reputation of a league and a country with deeper problems.
Source: forzaitalianfootball.com