Soccer fans behaving badly in Poland

There were fears before the Euro 2012 tournament kicked off that political tensions in Ukraine would spill over into the tournament. But so far, most of the drama seems to be in co-host Poland.  Black players on the Netherlands team were taunted with monkey noises during a practice in Krakow. Other black players including Italy’s ...

By , a former associate editor at Foreign Policy.
627218_poles_0.jpg
627218_poles_0.jpg

There were fears before the Euro 2012 tournament kicked off that political tensions in Ukraine would spill over into the tournament. But so far, most of the drama seems to be in co-host Poland. 

There were fears before the Euro 2012 tournament kicked off that political tensions in Ukraine would spill over into the tournament. But so far, most of the drama seems to be in co-host Poland. 

Black players on the Netherlands team were taunted with monkey noises during a practice in Krakow. Other black players including Italy’s Mario Balotelli and the Czech Republic’s Theodor Gebre Selassie have received racist chants from — from Spanish and Russian fans, respectively — during first-round games in Poland.

It also seems that things got pretty ugly in Warsaw ahead of today’s Russia-Poland match:

A march by thousands of Russian fans to mark their national day had to be halted and some missiles were thrown. About 6,000 police are on duty to keep the rival fans apart, the BBC’s Dan Roan reports from Warsaw.

Tensions are running high, given the centuries of rivalry between the two countries.

Some Polish fans on a bridge on the march route had tried to attack the Russian fans and had been involved in scuffles, the BBC’s Alex Capstick reports.[…]

In a separate incident, 50 Polish fans in masks attacked Russian fans in a Warsaw cafe, the Russian news agency Interfax reported.

Police authorities described today’s match as Warsaw’s "greatest ever" security challenge, which given the events of the last few centuries seems like a bit of an overstatement.  

So far at least, Ukraine actually seems relatively calm by comparison. 

Joshua Keating was an associate editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @joshuakeating

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