By Alexander Smith - NBC News
When Bukayo Saka, Marcus Rashford and Jadon Sancho missed their penalties, thus sanctioning England's defeat in the Euro 2020 soccer final against Italy, many fans sensed that they
would suffer harsh social retaliation
.
These three talented young black men made up the group of five footballers who
endured the enormous pressure
of trying to win England's first grand final in 55 years.
After his defeat, and despite having led the team to the final of the most important soccer tournament on the continent, his social networks were flooded with racist insults.
The London Metropolitan Police
opened an investigation
into these attacks, which were condemned by the English Football Association, Prince William, and Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who said that the "team deserves to be praised as heroes, not to be racially abused. . "
The general rejection of racist comments was a trend
on Monday in networks, including the phrase "no to racism", and the accounts of the players were flooded with messages of support that buried the insults.
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But for many fans it was the worst punishment for the defeat of the multicultural English team, which played high-quality football and whose professionals have shown
their social commitment
.
Some commentators believe that the racist insults have been fueled in part by an ugly
culture war
that has engulfed players, fueled by critics by Johnson's conservative government and other members of the political right.
"As it exists, and is in fact promoted by the prime minister, I knew that as soon as Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka failed, we would wake up with stories of racist abuse," former English player Gary Neville told Sky network on Monday. News.
Neville questioned Johnson's condemnation of racism when, in his previous work as a newspaper columnist, he described citizens of the Commonwealth - which includes former British colonies in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean - as "
piccaninos
" - a racist term. English against black children - with "
watermelon smiles
."
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Johnson said then that his words had been taken out of context and that he was "very sad" that people were so offended. "
NBC News, the sister network of Noticias Telemundo, has contacted the British Government for their opinion, but has not received a response.
Commentators from the world of sports and politics also argued that the government encourages double standards and even petty racism.
Players began each Euro Cup game by
kneeling
, an anti-racist gesture inspired by NFL player Colin Kaepernick, first embraced by English football last year after the murder of George Floyd.
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Seven of England's 11 starting players against Italy had a
foreign-born
father or grandfather
, according to the UK Migration Museum.
Saka's parents, 19, are from Nigeria, and Sancho, 21, from Trinidad and Tobago.
Rashford, 23, has grandparents from Saint Kitts (Saint Kitts).
The players of the national team have taken
actions in favor of harmony
and the welfare of society
in the past
.
Captain Harry Kane wore a rainbow-colored armband in support of the LGTBQ community during the game against Germany, and Rashford last year lobbied the British government to allow children from low-income families to receive free school meals. during summer break.
However, some English fans booed the players who took their knees as showing their support for the political goals of the Black Lives Matter movement.
The English team maintained that it was an
anti-racist statement
that had no relation to BLM.
Interior Minister Priti Patel, known for her tough anti-immigration policies, said she was "disgusted" that players had received "vile racist abuse on social media."
However, last month
he refused to condemn fans
who booed footballers who knelt, claiming it was about their freedom of expression, and criticized the BLM movement as a "gesture policy."
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The racist attacks didn't just happen on the internet.
A mural dedicated to Rashford in his hometown Manchester was vandalized with graffiti.
And racism in English football is not new either.
However, some experts consider that it is going
through the worst moment
since the heyday of
hooligans
in the 1980s, when certain fans called black players "monkeys" and threw bananas onto the field.
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"Over the past 10 years, the situation is more like the 1980s in terms of abuses against players, and the government and the tabloid press are entirely to blame," said Kehinde Andrews, Professor of Sports Studies. Black Race at the English University of Birmingham.
"The way we talk about race in this country is very poisonous, and it cannot be divorced from government racism," he added.
The
usual violence of the 1980s
also made an appearance at the tournament, when some English fans without a ticket stormed Wembley Stadium on Sunday and fought with others inside.
In the semi-final against Denmark, members of a Danish family said they were surrounded and assaulted by a dozen English fans.
In Europe, players are routinely attacked from the stands to the point that some have left the game in protest.
In 2019, the Italian newspaper
Corriere dello Sport
was criticized for mocking a match between Inter Milan and Roma, using images of two black players alongside the headline: "
Black Friday
."
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The English media rarely go to this level of public racism, but many continue to say that they are to blame.
Raheem Sterling, one of the stars of the English team and of Jamaican origin, established the connection between abusive fans and newspaper headlines who are more critical of black players than white players, which, he said, "fuels the racism and aggressive behavior.