[sarcasm]Oh Russia. How famous it is for football. How many international tournaments it has won. How great it`s clubs are. And how much the rest of the football worlds looks up to them as being great.
Russia has some tough teams and rich teams. It is also one of the major leagues of Europe, just under the big 3, along side the German and French. Racism is a problem for especially Zenit St. Petersburg. Oh and Zenit St. Petersburg won the 2008 UEFA cup, so they have won international tournaments.
Oh and Israel. How many international tournaments they made (1). How known they are throughout the world for their skills in the game.[/sarcasm]
Israel has produced quite a few great players and among them one of my favorite.. Yossi Benayoun who was always way underrated and underplayed imo. But regardless of the standing relative to other larger leagues, it has a major racism problem. It use to be much worse, but there still is one club that is very bad, and the guys who killed the Palestinian kid which lead ultimately to the war in Gaza... are reportedly ultra members of this club. And because they are racist against Arabs, then it is some how different or lesser than idiots who hate black people?
Spanish and Italian football however matter. And nothing compares to seeing what you can see in games played in Zaragossa or southern Italy.
And again it is banter. Almost all teams in Spain and Italy that are accused of racism, have black players. Look at the Italian teams from the South of the country. Napoli has at least 3 black players, and Palermo also has at least 2 black players. The Italian national team has one top star who is black... hell he is the biggest Italian player at the moment. The Spanish national team had Senna, a black player in the 2008 European Championship team. Most Spanish teams, including Zaragosa have or have had black players. In fact, the case I suspect you are referring too is against Etoo in 2006 where parts of the crowd did monkey chants against him. In the Zaragosa team that day.. 2 black players from Brazil. If the crowd were really racist and not just trying to mess with his head, then they should be doing the exact same against their own players right? That is what happens in Zenit St. Petersburg and with Beitar Jerusalem..
Is it stupid to use that kind of banter to piss off the opposition? Sure, it is, but so is calling someones mother a whore and that someones sister sleeps with dogs... and that happens far more often on the pitch and in the stands. Hell Zidane got abuse with something about his sister and headbutted a guy in the world cup final. Zidane was punished but the Italian defender was not... had the defender called Zidane something racist, then I bet it would have been the other way around.. and that is wrong.
Just this week there was a racist incident in England, which is being looked into. There was also a racist incident in Spain not long ago, where a woman was caught on camera doing it and she was banned from the stadium for life and arrested. This crap happens all over the place.
Right now there is far too much focus on supposed racism in Spain and Italy, which is mostly stupid banter to mess with the players heads (and it works.. as we saw with Etoo), and there is almost no focus on actual racists in clubs like Zenit or Beitar.. they are allowed to compete in Europe DESPITE it being a fact that part of their fanbase is utterly racist. How warped is that?