Friday, October 08, 2004

Spanish Coach Luis Aragones

In football, horrible things are often said about other people. Fans are usually good at finding names and calling people terrible things. One of the lowest denominators are the openly racist comments. UEFA has correctly tried to work against racism in football. In this context, it is much more deplorable when Spanish coach Mr. Aragonés recently crossed the line by shouting to José Reyes "Tell the Negro that you are better than him", refering to Mr. Reyes' Arsenal teammate, the great Thierry Henry.
Mr. Aragonés in national coach. He represents all of Spain, and the only signal he sends with this, is that these kinds of comments are accepted in Spain. Even though Mr. Aragonés has now issued an apology, FIFA should step in with a warning to the Spanish football federation. When fans do these things, clubs are often fined. Now it is not barely a fan, but one of the top men of Spanish football. It is a deplorable image to send out of Spanish football, and a step backward in fighting racism in football.

1 comment:

El Erik said...

Just a note to this: Mr. Aragonés has issued an apology, saying he did not mean what he said in a disrespectful way. Now, in Spanish he used the words "Negro de Mierda", literally meaning "Shitty black". However, this way of talking is more to be understood in the sense "F...ing N..ger". Now, how in the world can that be said not respectfully!!!????? Pathetic.