Booting Out The Racists

Everton striker Danny Cadamarteri was in Dublin last week for the Irish launch of Show Racism The Red Card, a fan-driven initiative which has already made its presence felt in England and Scotland.

The need for football and indeed society to clean up its act was brought into sharp focus a few days later when ooh-ooh-ooh noises accompanied Emile Heskey s every touch of the ball in England s game against Italy.
The taunts weren t confined to the opposition supporters, with a small contingent of British Movement-types chanting such choice couplets as, I d Rather Be A Paki Than A Jew , and Hello, Hello, England Are White.
As somebody who s already played for England Under-21s and hopes one day to make the step-up to the senior team, does it worry Cadamarteri that that sort of behaviour largely goes unchecked?
Yeah, players have been reluctant to speak their minds cause of the flak they might get, but it s up to us as much as anyone else to tell these people they re not wanted, says the 21-year-old. It s depressing that because of a handful of idiots, everybody abroad thinks that we re a racist nation. If you can t conduct yourself properly, stay away.
Of course, abuse isn t always confined to the stands, with Patrick Vieira accusing Sinisa Mihajlovic of making racist remarks to him during Arsenal s Champions League visit to Lazio.
He was absolutely right to draw attention to it. I m sure Mihajlovic would say, I was just doing it to put him off , but that s no excuse. If someone at Everton did it, I know for a fact that they d be fined and dropped from the team. Which is the proper response.
Has Danny ever been racially abused by a fellow professional?
I don t way to say what team or player it was, but yeah, I ve been called a black this and a black that , he nods. Your natural inclination is to thump em, but of course you can t do that. Either on or off the pitch, cause you d just be sinking to their level. Not letting it get to you means that you re the winner.
Although now as multi-racial as any team in the Premiership, it wasn t too long ago that Everton s squad was almost exclusively white. Giving Neanderthal elements something to latch onto, racist chanting was commonplace at Goodison Park during the eighties and nineties, and led to players like Les Ferdinand turning down lucrative moves to Merseyside.
Some of my mates in Bradford said, you re mad going there , but I ve not really had any problems. If I d been an opposition player coming to Goodison 5, 10 years ago, then it might have been different. The fact that Walter Smith s let me off training to come here and do this shows that Everton are committed to stamping out racism, whoever it s directed at.
To get their Irish campaign underway, Show Racism The Red Card are making a 20-minute educational video available to schools. Conveying a powerful anti-racist message through the medium of professional football , it features such prominent figures as Niall Quinn, Ryan Giggs, David Ginola, Alan Shearer, Juninho, Thierry Henry, Kenny Cunningham, Bobby Robson, and Rio Ferdinand who was an East London schoolmate of Stephen Lawrence s.
When he was murdered the school kind of came to a standstill, Ferdinand reveals. It was unbelievable because Stephen was never the kind of person to promote trouble of any kind. He was an A Level student and he was going on to do good things and then his life was brought to an immediate halt, so it was terrible.
His parents are doing an unbelievable job, the way they re fighting the system. They ve really made sure that they ve dug their heels in and carried on with the campaign.
The West Ham man believes that police and stewards should be doing more to stamp out racism at grounds.
I was sitting in the stands and there was a policeman standing behind me about three rows back, he says, recalling an incident that happened when he was 18. The visiting team had a few black players in the side, and I think one of them scored a goal. And this guy right in front of me started saying you black this and you black that . So I looked at my friend and said I think I m going to leave, I can t sit here and listen to this all the time and the policeman didn t say or do anything. I looked at the policeman and he looked away, as if to say I didn t hear it.
Given the professional game s head-in-the-sand tendencies, it s heartening that over a hundred players and managers agreed to appear on the video. There s also been a positive response from the FAI who ve okayed the production of 100,000 Ireland Show Racism The Red Card squad posters.
It s got nothing to do with the issue at hand, but seeing as we ve got a former teammate of his in our midst, we ought to ask about Richard Dunne s unceremonious departure from Everton.
I was a bit surprised that he left, to be honest, but what s good for a club isn t always what s good for an individual, is Danny Cadamarteri s diplomatic response. We all rated him as a player, and I m sure he ll do very well at Man City.
And what about Gazza?
Nice bloke, dreadful taste in music, he laughs. He was in physio yesterday with his thigh, and it was wall-to-wall Bruce Springsteen and Genesis on the stereo!

For more information on the Show Racism The Red Card video and education resource pack phone (086) 3004299. You can also log on to their website at www.srtrc.org