England captain Harry Kane has called on Uefa to introduce a zero-tolerance approach to racism after their 6-0 win over Bulgaria was marred by shocking abuse. Play was halted twice during the first half as head coach Gareth Southgate reported incidents, including monkey chanting and Nazi salutes, to the Croatian match officials.
In keeping with Uefa’s three-step anti-racism protocol, an announcement was made over the public address system urging supporters to stop, before England were given the opportunity to leave the field during the second break in play close to half-time. They decided unanimously to continue and after around 50 fans were ejected at the break, England ran out easy winners.
However, the result was a mere footnote to a shameful night in which debutant Tyrone Mings revealed the racist abuse began during the warm-up. While Southgate insisted he had “full faith” in the procedures in place, Kane said: “Whether the UEFA protocols are strong enough, I am not sure. Should any racial abuse be allowed at any time? It shouldn’t be. The protocol at the moment allows there to be an announcement and two or three steps before the players are taken off the pitch. It is unacceptable to be racist once, so I feel there can be stronger punishments and protocols.”
The first step did not come until the 27th minute, with the public address announcement calling for an end to the abuse in both Bulgarian and English loudly booed by sections of the home support. Play was stopped again in the 42nd minute, when England’s players were offered the chance to leave the pitch. They opted to forego the second step and play on until half-time, when they decided against abandoning the Euro 2020 qualifier.
Southgate said afterwards that if the abuse had continued into the second half, his players would have taken the option of step two. Kane added: “There was a discussion in the changing room and everyone wanted to carry on playing. If there were players who didn’t, we wouldn’t have come back out and played. That shows the squad, the maturity and the character that everyone wanted to come back out and play.”
Uefa are set to launch an official investigation once the referee’s report is submitted. The FARE network will help the governing body build a “legally safe” case to prosecute Bulgaria, whose coach Krasimir Balakov insisted he did not hear any abuse. Domestic anti-discrimination campaigners Kick It Out also urged Uefa to take strong action, given Bulgaria’s history of racist incidents. The Vasil Levski Stadium was partially closed on Monday night as a sanction for discriminatory behaviour in June’s qualifiers, while two of their club sides have been punished during this season’s Europa League competition.
