A Sunday marked by two sad events that was experienced Serie B, with still unseemly episodes of racism that have stained two stadiums in Italy as is now known, racist insults rained down on Mehdi Dorval in Reggiana-Bari, with the player from the Emilian team Gondo calling for justice, while something more serious happened in Brescia. The local fans, in fact, targeted the Nigerian Ebenezer Akinsanmiro with racist howls, who responded to the Brescia curve to the advantage of his team with a ballet that recalled the movements of a monkey, then ironically applauding the Lombard public when Mr. Semplici was forced to replace him to avoid the situation from escalating. Which was then commented by the Rondinelle coach Pierpaolo Bisoli in this revisable way: “Akinsanmiro? You can’t provoke the public like that. I hadn’t heard anything before, but regardless you have to have respect”. That respect that is due first and foremost to those on the pitch.
So League B took to the field, with the press release reported below:
“It is necessary to invest in the culture of respect” this is the comment of the president of the Lega B Paolo Bedin on the unfortunate events that occurred yesterday in two stadiums of the cadetteria.
“These are behaviors that are now unacceptable, as well as anachronistic, outside the social context in which we live. Respect for the person, on and off the field, is a primary and inviolable value that sport must enhance, never trample on.”
With AIA and Can, a protocol will be defined that uniformly regulates any cases of racist chants during matches. Furthermore, in the coming weeks, the League and its clubs will be the protagonists of a series of initiatives aimed at combating all forms of racism, violence and abuse.