World cup qualifiers are in news around the world especially looking at the world cup 2014 dates, hence each of the qualifiers is being taken as an important clash by every team seeking its place in the world cup. But, luck is not in favor of Bulgaria and Hungary who just received a FIFA veto about their spectators behaviors, i.e., their world cup qualifier with be played without any spectator’s presence in the stadium or in a lonely planet. The punishment is being given by the governing body for the racial abuses of Bulgaria and Hungary fans on appointing teams which is classified by FIFA as abhorrent and shameful. The strict punishment was also demanded by various players associations and anti-discriminatory groups to deprive fans using any racial chant again. Last October, a Bulgaria fan made monkey chant over Denmark black defender Patrick Mtiliga in a world cup qualifier. As a result, Bulgaria will have to play its next qualifier against Malta on March 22 in a vacant stadium. Besides spectators ban, FIFA also imposed a 35,000 Swiss francs fine on Bulgaria and 40,000 Swiss francs on Hungary as monetary fine.
Moreover, when FIFA resident recently issued a statement that “sanctions must be a deduction of points or something similar,” it took breath away of both teams coz any probable point deduction would have reduced their chance to qualify for the world Cup, but fortunately to them, FIFA did not deduct any point for now which would have a severe setback for both these teams. FIFA issued a statement post ban that reads as, “FIFA strongly condemns all forms of racism in football, and any form of discrimination will not be tolerated and will receive a strong response by the relevant FIFA authorities. The offensive, denigratory and discriminatory action of a small group of Bulgarian supporters was shameful.”
Notably, the courageous step taken by governing body is being appreciated from everyone, especially looking at the recent cases where crowd became uncontrollable and used adverse racial chanting. Real Madrid walk out incident is still afresh in our memories; hence something like this is necessary to deprive spectators behaving unpredictably. However, its results are yet to be seen where it would be interested to see if crowd is really bothered about their teams getting punished, or it is just an eye wash to take away the attention from the incident, wait and watch.