Germany's Olympic football team leaves pitch after alleged racist abuse during Honduras clash

Racism in football has been a heavily debated topic in the past number of days. In the aftermath of the Euro 2020 final where Italy beat England on penalties, three English players of colour had come under heavy racial abuse as they missed their spot-kicks. Most recently, another incident of racial abuse has come to light. Members of the Germany Olympics football team walked off the pitch after their player, Jordan Torunarigha, suffered racial abuse during a practice match against Honduras in Japan on Saturday. The match against the Central American nation was in preparation for their Olympics campaign that will begin in a matter of days.

Honduras had taken the lead in the match and Germany had equalized later on through Felix Uduokhai before the alleged incident took place. There was still five minutes of the match left to play when the German players walked off as a response to the abuse their player suffered. “The game had to be stopped five minutes before the end when the score was 1-1. After our player Jordan Torunarigha was racially insulted, the German team left the field together,” Germany Olympics football team’s Twitter account tweeted after the incident.

The DFB, Germany’s biggest footballing body, has also reportedly confirmed that the alleged insult was directed at the 23-year-old defender by one of the Honduras players. The match was played behind closed doors at Wakayama in keeping with Japan’s strict coronavirus prevention measures.

NOT TORUNARIGHA’S FIRST BOUT WITH RACIAL ABUSE

This is not the first time Torunarigha has faced racial abuse. As a matter of fact, he faced so from the fans of German football during a DFB-Pokal match against Schalke in February of 2020. The fans of Schalke directed racial abuse towards the 23-year-old at the time. As a result, the Bundesliga side was fined 50000 euros by DFB.

Footballing bodies across the world have been taking note of incidents of racial abuse against players especially after the final of Euro 2020. Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho, and Bukayo Saka failed to convert their penalty kicks in the match against Italy. It resulted in the Azzurri lifting the European crown for the second time in their history, while England is yet to win it even once. What followed was a barrage of racial abuse directed at the three, especially on social media. A mural of Rashford in his hometown was defaced with racial slurs spray-painted on it.

After these incidents, fans around the globe have spoken out in support of the three players, and the FA and the British government have promised strict action against the ones propagating such hate. Rashford’s mural was also fixed in no time by fans.

“Whether it be the color of my skin, where I grew up or, most recently, how I decide to spend my time off the pitch I can take critique of my performance all day long, my penalty was not good enough, it should have gone in but I will never apologize for who I am and where I came from,” the Manchester United forward said about the matter.