Solomon-Otabor recalls sickening abuse he received while playing for CSKA Sofia

Published on: 06 June 2020

As sport continues to mobilise behind the Black Lives Matter movement after the shocking death of George Floyd, Sportsmail speaks to those who have suffered racial injustices in football.

The Bulgarian league restarts on Saturday but Viv Solomon-Otabor will not be there. The financial impact of coronavirus at CSKA Sofia dictated that the 24-year-old — one of their top earners — left the club and returned to England.

His season had been promising, invigorated by a first Nigeria call-up, and the former Birmingham City winger is now looking for a fresh start. A fresh start away from bigots, too.

‘I was racially abused three times during matches,’ Solomon-Otabor tells Sportsmail. ‘It’s heartbreaking. You think, why? You can’t comprehend why someone wants to tear you down because of the colour of your skin.’

The abuse began after England’s infamous Euro 2020 qualifier in Sofia last October. Solomon-Otabor recalls his shock at the vitriol volleyed at Gareth Southgate’s black players. Until then, he did not realise the extent of racism in that country.

UEFA fined Bulgaria £65,000. Fans targeted him with monkey chants after that night and he was also abused online.

‘My family told me to stop reading those comments,’ he says. ‘Block, delete and move on. It’s easy saying that though, isn’t it? You keep looking. Why did they say that?

‘They’d always find something to abuse you over. It’s wrong. I trained myself to stop reading them. I was clicking on the same message three or four times. The more you look, the more it upsets you.

‘You know within yourself how you’ve done in a game, you don’t need to read stuff.

‘The club were supportive. The president called me into his office and said, “They’re stupid people, don’t worry, we’ve got it under control”. My team-mates were the same. There was action taken, fines. It’s not enough but at least they showed there was care.’

Solomon-Otabor refuses to allow those experiences to define his time in Bulgaria. Manager Ljupko Petrovic, who won the European Cup with Red Star Belgrade in 1991, had a profound effect on his attitude before resigning in October.

‘CSKA are a massive club,’ he says. ‘It was a great opportunity. I was becoming much more tactically aware under him (Petrovic). Training was tougher, they were stricter on food.

‘We’d stay at hotels before every game — home and away. It was completely different. I guess it’s discipline.

‘You’d get blasted if you’re a little bit overweight. I was 82kg (12st 13lb) and thought that was fine but the manager looked at me, “No, no, I need you at 78kg”. I weighed 78kg when I was coming through at Birmingham.

‘I had to work hard with diet and training and I lost that in two weeks. I’ve come back to England with that mentality. I’ll take myself out of my comfort zone again in pursuit of getting to the top.’

Source: m.allfootballapp.com

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