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November 24, 2004
Wenger wouldn't walk!
In an interview in this morning's Sun newspaper in England, The Boss insists that walking the team off the pitch in the event of racist abuse from the Eindhoven fans would be the wrong thing to do. Given the fact that Thierry Henry was racially abused in our last game there two years ago, the decision will be down to the German referee, Herbert Fandel, who has already said that he will abandon the game if the Dutch fans provide a repeat performance...
Fearing violence in that event, Arsene Wenger said,
"I found it very cowardly at that time not to continue with the game.
"For me, it was completely the wrong decision and I still do not think it is right to take the teams off the pitch.
"I hope there will be no trouble at all in Eindhoven.
"But if the referee says we must go off then that is what we will do.
"I do not make the rules, I can only accept them and respect them.
"But it does not look to be a solution with any reasonable outcome because we have a job to entertain the people who have paid to come and watch the game.
"At least 90 per cent of those supporters don't chant racist abuse and we have to respect those people rather than the small minority."
Much as I admire The Boss, I'm not sure that I agree with him. There certainly are problems with walking a team off the pitch (since some fans could use this to get a game abandoned while they are leading or only losing by a goal or so) but the punishments so far inflicted on clubs in Europe (fines and closed-door games) do not seem to have had any effect on the problem.
I don't pretend to have the answers, though the strong stewarding and policing inside England's foremost stadia, combined with education and a zero tolerance attitude towards racism seem to have largely removed that blight from the English game. How you transfer that success to Europe, if you can at all, is another matter though...
Posted by gcurtis at November 24, 2004 09:01 AM