British Prime Minister Tony Blair and the Spanish prime minister on Thursday condemned the racist abuse of black England footballers by thousands of Spanish fans as the disgraceful scenes on Wednesday night prompted outrage in Britain and threatened to escalate into a diplomatic row.
Several black England players were taunted with monkey chants and chants by large sections of the crowd at the Santiago Bernabeu stadium during England’s 1-0 defeat.
The scale and vehemence of the abuse was condemned by Richard Caborn, the Sports Minister, but the Spanish authorities failed to acknowledge the taunts until Thursday afternoon, when the office of the Prime Minister, José Luis RodrÃguez Zapatero, described the abuse as intolerable.
”The racist and xenophobic commentaries of this group, which is not representative of Spanish supporters, are intolerable,” a spokesperson for Zapatero said. ”They are unacceptable in sport or any other circumstance.”
Blair’s office had described the British prime minister as ”very disappointed” by events in Madrid. ”He believes racism has no part to play in sport — or anywhere else for that matter,” a spokesperson said.
On Thursday night the Spanish football federation and large parts of the local media had not acknowledged that the abuse occurred, fuelling the belief that a failure to condemn previous racist incidents had contributed to the level and vehemence of the attacks on England players.
The England team arrived in Spain determined to demonstrate against racism after the Spanish coach, Luis Aragones, described the Arsenal striker Thierry Henry as a ”black shit”.
Aragones, who has not apologised or been censured by the Spanish federation for his outburst, said before the match that his ”conscience was clear”, and said the English were racist. He refused to answer questions about the abuse after the match.
The abuse, the worst example of racism at an England match in decades, was greeted with disgust and disbelief in the United Kingdom, which is acknowledged as leading the way in European football in the battle against racism.
Politicians and campaigners from across the spectrum called for an apology from the Spanish authorities and demanded action from the European and world football governing bodies. Fifa confirmed that it would be ”seeking an explanation” from the Spanish, and has the power to force them to play games behind closed doors.
Caborn, who has written to his Spanish counterpart demanding an apology, said the failure to condemn Aragones might have contributed to events.
”Tackling racism requires a clear message from the leadership, and it needs those at the top of sport to speak out,” the minister said. ”It was quite disgraceful. That is what we had on the terraces 20 or 30 years ago here in England.”
Caborn suggested that in future match officials should consider leading the teams from the field when abuse reached such levels.
Many England supporters, some of whom were the victims of unprovoked attacks by Spanish police before the game, said the players should have left the field in protest.
Piara Power, head of the Kick Racism Out of Football campaign, called for Spain to be suspended from European football and blamed the Spanish FA for effectively condoning racism. ”We believe that the Spanish FA’s inept handling of Aragones remarks contributed to the events. Unless the will to drive change is shown by the Spanish football association, unprecedented measures need to be taken, including a suspension of all Spanish activity in European football.”
The England captain, David Beckham, who plays his club football for Real Madrid at the Bernabeu, said he was ”disappointed” at the reaction, which came after similar incidents on Tuesday night, when England’s under-21 side were the victims of abuse.
Adrian Bevington, the FA’s head of media relations, confirmed that the FA would be pressing for Spain to be pursued by the authorities. ”Football as a whole should stand up and express its disgust at what has gone on here. Quite frankly, it’s a disgrace,” he said.
The abuse was hugely embarrassing to Madrid’s bid for the 2012 Olympics, which was launched hours before kick-off and used the game to launch its international marketing campaign. – Guardian Unlimited