Once again racism within sport has come to forefront on both sides of the Atlantic, with one league taking an immediate strong stance by banning LA Clippers owner Donald Sterling for life and fining him $2.5 million. Not that it was right on any level, but Mr Sterling could feel a bit hard done by as he thought he was talking in a private conversation before having his thoughts blasted out across the world. Compared to European football's publicly racist actions evident for the whole world to see.
This strong stance by the NBA seems impossible for UEFA to replicate, whether its standing up to national leagues, clubs, managers or players. The entire NBA bullied Donald Sterling out of the league, from his own players and fans standing up against his remarks. The thought of a European football team doing that would never happen, due to the ludicrous nature of UEFA's disciplinary code and the risk of being punished for standing up to racism. Just ask Nicklas Bendtner who was fined £80,000 for flashing a betting companies name on his underwear when scoring a goal at Euro 2012. That is £15,000 more than Serbia were fined for the racist behaviour of their under 21 team and fans in a game against England where the English players were the bullied on that occasion. This weeks flash point within Europe came when Barcelona Defender Dani Alves had a banana thrown at him, which he consequently took a bite out of and got on with the game (one of the only actions of his that I've respected).
The Villarreal fan has since been banned for life by the club and arrested by the Spanish police. The football world has also jumped on the twitter bandwagon by taking a picture of themselves posing with a banana. But is this just to get followers for their own twitter accounts or an actual effort to eradicate racism from the game. UEFA's record of dishing out fines of pitiful amounts need to take notes off NBA commissioner Adam Silver who fined Sterling the maximum amount allowed under the NBA rules. If this continues the Dani Alves incident will once again just be another case of racism that has been swept under the carpet until something much worse occurs due to a racist fan or organisation.
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