The treatment of Mario Balotelli, and football's fight against racism

There is perhaps not a player in the modern era who has attracted as much media attention, good and bad, as Mario Balotelli. At times he seems to court it, matching wacky antics with phenomenal talent - a former manager of his, Roberto Mancini, said he would be as good as Cristiano Ronaldo and Messi, if only he could focus his energies into playing.

 

During his time at Manchester City the British media focused largely on the antics, the laughs - like the time he wandered into a college in Manchester looking for a toilet, or the time he drove around the city high-fiving fans after winning the Manchester derby. They also looked at the two contrasting sides of his playing - the talent, which saw him set up the goal which gave Manchester City their first league title in decades, and the flaws, which saw his almost conspire to lose City the league when he went rogue in a match against Arsenal, getting sent off for a tackle that could have broken an opponents leg and generally causing his team more hassle than good.

 

He's since moved to AC Milan, where, unfortunately, most of the coverage has focused on the racism he has encountered. Most recently fans of Inter Milan (who Balotelli played for before moving to Manchester) abused him during a game against Chievo. This is not the first time that Balotelli has been the target of racist abuse from fans, both at club level and international when playing for Italy, and it is likely that the Inter fans attitude to him has soured since he joined their big rivals (as happens with just about any football player). Although he has not been at the club a month, there is also another controversy concerning his race - Paolo Berlusconi, brother of Silvio and vice-president of AC Milan, referred to Mario as '...' - 'the family's little n-----'. The club released a press photo of Paolo and Mario shaking hands during a training conference, but it is difficult to see how the incredibly offensive remark can be easily glossed over. Not only because of the use of the n word, but also by the connotations of making Balotelli sound as if he is owned in some way by the family, a fact exacerbated by the rumours that AC Milan signed him to give Silvio Berlusconi a boost in the forth-coming Italian election. Not only has he been racially abused in his time at Milan, Balotelli is also being treated as a commodity, a piece of arm candy.

 

Racism in British football, that we know of, happens, by and large, in isolation. Last season the English Premier League saw two major race-based controversies - Luis Suarez of Liverpool, and John Terry of Chelsea, both found to have racially abused opponents during matches, and both given bans. Subsequently, support was shown by both Liverpool and Chelsea fans to their respective players, although both men are now booed at just about every ground they visit. The media is therefore surprised when this new-found tolerance is not replicated across Europe. Before England were due to travel to Euro 2012 in Poland and Ukraine the BBC ran a documentary about the level of racism that occurs at club level in these countries, largely due to the prevalence of neo-nazi groups in the Ultras section of each team's support. In Spain, accusations of racist insults by several Barcelona players began to drip out, before, more and more, it became apparent that racist abuse by players in Spain, and especially in El Clasico, was to be expected. It was part of trying to put off your opponent. Again, in Italy, a pre-season game between AC Milan and Pro Patria was distrupted by fans of the latter team racially abused Kevin Prince Boateng.

 

While often players attempt to shrug off the insults, Boateng took an approach which shocked everyone, and propelled the game from no-mark friendly to one which prompted headlines across Europe - he walked off. After hearing monkey chants whenever he was in possession, Boateng kicked the ball at the fans who had abused him, and walked off. His team followed him in solidarity, leaving players of the Pro Patria to reprimand their owns fans at the touchline.

 

This is perhaps the most radical and significant step taken by a player to combat racism. Their shirking of tackling the abuse (which is understandable, given the pressure that players are under) leaves it to governing bodies such as Fifa and Uefa to tackle racism, which they are hugely ineffective at. The usual incident pointed to here is that of Nicolas Bentnar, who was given a fine of £80,000 during the Euros for exposing his branded underwear (this article contrasts that incident with other major fines given out by football governing bodies). This is more than any team has ever been fined for racist abuse by their fans. In the eyes of Uefa and Fifa, making monkey chants at players is bad, but advertising a non-sponsor during a match is even worse. For all the claims to want to remove racism from football, their paltry actions undermine them straight away. Fifa seem to maintain that by getting players to wear 'Kick Racism Out of Football' t-shirts before a game will indeed kick racism out of football. It hasn't, and it won't. Sepp Blatter, the comically inept and corrupt head Fifa, also refused to back Boateng in walking off, while maintaining that he against racism, and wanted it removed from football. of  The lack of positive action from governing bodies, I believe, means that players who have been racially abused will want to ignore it, and play it down, as they have no one to back them up.

 

The actions of Boateng and his Milan teammates is incredibly important. It shows the only way in which football can effectively tackle it's racism problem. If the withdrawal of football itself does not stop the fans - and this, unfortunately, is likely, as racist fans have shown time and time again that the docking of points, or issuing of fines to their teams does not stop them - then the withdraw of football from Fifa will. It will disrupt to product, and thus the revenue. The AC Milan game against Pro Patria was an insignificant game in footballing terms - anyone without a keen interest in either team is unlikely to have known it was going ahead - but imagine if it happened in a high profile league game, or even Champions League game. If Balotelli, or Boateng, or any other player, is abused during the up-coming Milan derby and both teams walk off, what will happen then. Perhaps very little, it may lead to more walk-offs, and, at that point, Fifa will have to act. It is shameful that it would take them to that point, but it is better than not reaching there at all.

Football is hyper-capitalism

Soccer is hyper-capitalism. It is the space that a free market would ultimately expand in to. The money that moves between clubs, and between owners, is nothing short of ridiculous, mind-bending, even.

PSG, currently feeling the effects of a Middle-Eastern sugar daddy, spent nearly $200 million over the summer on player transfers alone. They bought three players.

A few weeks ago, berk (and former footballer), Robbie Savage stated that be believed Lionel Messi alone was worth £100 million for his services.

Until the recent attempts of Michael Platini to implement his financial fair play (FFP) rules, football did not have the monitory constraints that many other international markets have. The FFP rules are intended to reign in the spending of clubs, ensuring that they do not spend more than their means, and that they give due concern to their existing debts. It also limits the number of years which a club can record a financial loss. The richest teams have continued undeterred, as you might have guessed would happen. The record debts and record fees continue to spiral upwards, one propping the other up.

It’s within this context that I read Rudi Batzell’s shortanalysis for the NFL referee strike, and a plea to nationalise football. Until I read the article, I had no idea of this strike, and, as someone who doesn’t follow American football, I have no idea of the surrounding context.

But the basic facts are that, for an entire season, NFL referees have been out on strike. The unionised referees were locked out by the owners over a dispute concerning pensions and secure working conditions. In American sporting lingo, they are on ‘lockout’ – the combined might of the owners of the NFL teams have barred them, and hired scabs in their place. The problem with scabbing in this context is that, to be a referee, you need years of training and practise, and the ability to make decisions based on obscure, garbled evidence. The scab referees do not have this, and since the start of the season there have been wrongly-given penalties, confusion and inconsistency. Batzell points out that his team, the Green Bay Packers, lost a game to Seattle because of the inability of the scab referees to police the game.

Batzell goes on to argue for a non-profit NFL, one without owners, played for the good of the game. The community-owned Green Bay Packers follow this example, but they are the only team to do so.

“Imagine the NFL as a factory. The production line workers are the players. It is a beautiful game, but playing football is brutal and violent work—most players have short careers and sacrifice their bodies for their vocation. The coaches, scouts, and trainers are the engineers, production planners, and shopfloor managers in the factory. Their schemes, strategies, and training prepare and coordinate the production process. Combined with the skills of the athletes, they engineer schemes and tactics that keep the game evolving and competitive.

The refs could easily be overlooked, but they play a crucial part in the valuation process. They are the quality control specialists, ensuring that working conditions are uniform and safe, and that a quality product is turned out, play-by-play and week-by-week. But the scabs can’t tell a touchdown from an interception, and the quality of the product—play-by-play and week-by-week—has deteriorated. If we want to keep this factory running, change has to start at the top.

What do owners do? They sit in luxury boxes, monocles, cigars, and brandy in hand, sucking their bloody profits from the bodies and minds of the players, coaches and refs. Much like the super-wealthy in other sectors, at their best they provide story lines for the tabloids. But now the football capitalists are destroying their own industry.”

 

In comparing the mechanisms of football – both in the American and European contexts – as a whole to a traditional production-line factory, Batzell raises the important question of whether football can be seen to function like the rest of capitalism. The workers may be vastly overpaid, but they still sell their labour to the capitalist owners, who proceed to make vast profits from them. Work is still unpaid labour, no matter what the scale. The reliance on scabs, brought in to replace skilled workers, has had a similarly detrimental effect that it would have if you brought in random members of the public and asked them to start buying cars for you.*

 

The capitalist mechanisms of football are the same as the workings of the wider economy, but this particular industry has bloated to a scale which is uncontrollable. Like the banking industry, football exists on a cloud of speculation and money which flows unstoppably between a select few capitalists. The idea of football as a working class sport is dead, or dying, pricing people out at the bottom, and alienating them at the top.

But is the nationalisation and community ownership model truly the way forward? Or, a more accurate question – is it viable? Like the example of the Green Bay Packers, community-owned clubs do exist, but in isolation. The most famous example is Barcelona, which benefits from being one of the most iconic clubs in the world to draw in money. Yet it is mired in hundreds of millions of debt, and is another club using Qatar oil as a leaning post. On the other end of the financial scale, Stirling Albion, a Scottish third division club bought by the local community after a conflict with the previous owner. They reached the first division, before falling apart financially and falling to the very bottom league position of Scottish football.

There are, however, examples where community ownership, and therefore community benefit, works. The German Bundesliga dictates that fans must own at least 51% of every club. The Bundesliga is regarded as the most fan-friendly league in Europe, as well as one of the more competitive ones. Similar rules exist in Turkey and Sweden.

Most countries have smattering of fan-owned clubs, but in England community clubs have emerged as a form of protest, as much as a community activity. F.C. United of Manchester were started as a protest again the Glazer ownership of Manchester United, A.F.C. Liverpool give fans who have been priced out of Premier League matches a chance to watch league football, and AFC Wimbledon were started by fans of the old Wimbledon team after it was bought over and forcibly moved to Milton Keynes (to become MK Dons). All play in the lower leagues, on tiny budgets compared to their professional rivals, but all operate on a community-first basis, attempting to wrestle control of football away from money.

This is ultimately a more viable option. Fans have the necessary passion to drive these projects forward. They can take back control of clubs and give them back to the community. Some clubs won't be as successful, but it would stop the death-spiral of increasing debt and output. Of course, this is a significant upheaval - a revolution in the way that football is run. It would have to happen globally. But these smaller clubs give hope to the bigger ones. Change can start from the ground up.

 

*Scottish football was hit by a similar referee strike in the 2010/2011 season, when referees withdrew their labour, forcing the SFA to bring in scabs from around Europe, and anywhere else they could find them. These scabs were in fact professionals, which differs to the NFL story above, and, as far as I know, there were no major controversies over decisions. The referees went on strike over a number of reasons, but it was mainly the way they had been treated by the media, the fans, and members of the football clubs. I imagine pay comes into it as well - referees are paid £800 per game, which sounds like a lot, but this only comes to a maximum of £10,000 per year. Most will probably make less.