In the last seven years, four different clubs have won the Premier League, with the team who now finishes bottom earning £93m, compared to the winners in 2012 who earned £60m. We’ve seen Gareth Bale become the first player to be bought for €100m, a figure which has subsequently been beaten nine times. New laws have also been brought in to change kick-offs, deal with a player who has a head injury, and see when someone is 3mm offside. A lot has changed in football since I went to Serbia with my England Under-21 teammates in October 2012, but, sadly, racism is not one of those things.
Having played in similar circumstances to those the England players experienced against Bulgaria on Monday night, it saddens me to see that people are still having to work in that kind of environment. For me this is an incredibly sad depiction of where the world seems to be at the moment.
Why one human being can believe they are superior to another because of skin colour, beliefs or circumstance that the lottery of birth gave to them, is simply unfathomable to me.
Some people of a much higher profile than myself have given their opinions on this matter, where they have expressed an opinion that racism isn’t a problem in football, it’s a problem in society. Of course, I completely agree that racism has been and still is a problem in society, but to dismiss the fact that football – as one of the biggest and most powerful industries in the world – has a key role to play is completely irresponsible.
Football is a part of a multitude of things that make up what our society looks and acts like, so it has to show more responsibility and initiative towards doing what is right. It may not be in the hands of football to make the changes we need, but football can certainly affect the conversation, so it has to do so.
Watching the game on Monday I was disappointed by a lot of things but two in particular. Firstly, what Uefa’s protocol for racism actually looked like in action and, secondly, the fact that England had the opportunity to make a powerful stand against racism, but ultimately wilted.
I fail to put into words how despicable it is to have a stadium announcer ask for a crowd to stop dehumanising football players because of their skin colour via racial abuse, as the first step.
To give them one opportunity, then another, and then one more, is completely pointless to me if you are going to ultimately let them get away with it.
A three-step protocol shows how seriously our footballing authorities take this matter. I wonder how many steps the protocol is for a team who plays an ineligible player, a manager who fixes a game, or a player who breaks advertising rules? A person being racially abused at their place of work is unequivocally worse than all of the other “crimes” listed above, and yet in our beautiful game, is treated the most leniently. It just goes to show what the likes of Fifa, Uefa, and even our own Football Association, value the most.
Just as decades ago, a time we now look back in disgust at and wonder how these heinous acts were allowed to stand for so long, without properly being addressed as and when they arose, I can see us in the future looking at moments like these in shame, when questions such as who gets the points, what will the score be, and how will this affect ranking are asked.
I 100% believe England should have made a statement and walked off the pitch in Sofia. I think it should have been Gareth Southgate making the call to pull his team out of that. Maybe he does not feel it is his place to make the decision, which is understandable, and a difficult position for him to be in, but without a doubt that game should not have finished. Some people have said that if the players walk off, then the racists win. I can’t see how in contrast that staying on the pitch and continuing to get abuse is the players winning.
This is another opportunity for Uefa and Fifa to prove that their stance on racism is more than just a gimmick. How many more times are we going to “say no to racism” whilst allowing it to continue, before we genuinely do something to change what is happening?
Marvin Sordell played for Watford, Bolton and Burnley among other clubs in a 10-year professional career and represented England Under-21s and the Great Britain Olympic team
