Everything goes very quickly on Monday. Suddenly, sport expelled Russia from the international community. It will take a long time, a very long time, to do that. The Polish Football Association is an example of the rebellion against the major associations, which is showing courage. Unlike a German club.
Suddenly everything happened very quickly. First the IOC spoke and soon FIFA followed, followed by other associations. The floodgates were open and Russia’s place in the sporting world was history for the time being. For a long time, the powerful officials around IOC President Thomas Bach and FIFA boss Gianni Infantino hoped to be able to sit out the attack on Ukraine. An unrealistic assessment, which they corrected from Sunday under pressure from the international community. Examples of this are the Polish Football Association PZPN and Robert Lewandowski, the captain of the Polish national team. They were the first to rebel against the timid attitude of the large associations.
“FIFA suspended Russia! The fight for the right cause was successful! We showed that strength can come from solidarity,” PZPN President Cezary Kulesa tweeted in English, a language he cannot speak but does had sent his word to every corner of the world several times over the past few days: “We just did the right thing!”
On Sunday things got really tight for Russian sport for the first time. FIFA hid the actual message well when they announced the first sanctions against Russian football in a statement. “FIFA will continue the dialogue with the IOC, UEFA and other sporting bodies to determine additional measures or sanctions, including a possible ban from competitions, to be applied in the near future should the situation not improve quickly,” it said it there in technical language.
The map is redrawn
That was the big and last threat of sport before the massive events this Monday, which will reorganize world sport for the next few years and which was ultimately the last face-saving resort for the major associations and the IOC. The pressure on them had become too great and they now had to choose between Russia and the rest of the world. Aside from football, numerous other sports faced Russia throughout the day.
Putin’s war in Ukraine has also redrawn the map of sport. The consequences of the connection between sport and politics, which can no longer be denied even for the organizations that have long put money before attitude and have always denied the influence of politics, must now be far-reaching and go far beyond the ban on the Kremlin.
The story of Russia’s suspension is one that can only be told through the bravery of the Polish Football Association PZPN and its national team. They should have played against Russia on March 24 in Moscow as part of the playoffs for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. But they risked their dream of participating in the World Cup. They announced a boycott and rallied numerous associations behind them. There were too many for UEFA and FIFA to ignore. They could now choose either the aggressor or those who opposed him.
Lewandowski in an unusual role
“Enough of the words, it’s time to act,” said Poland’s association president Cezary Kulesa early on Saturday. It was clear that FIFA would not act. On Thursday, in the person of President Gianni Infantino, she was even more undecided and hoped for an early end to the war against Ukraine. For a long time, the president was a useful idiot for Vladimir Putin, who wanted to put his country in the right light through numerous sporting events such as the 2018 World Cup. But during the war, Infantino’s pleas went unheeded. That is why Poland acted. That’s why Kulesa and Robert Lewandowski, the captain of the national team, acted.
Until then, Lewandowski was not suspected of having a political opinion. It seemed like he was only interested in his career. He freed himself from that. In the face of the horror in the neighboring country, he, the reserve captain of Bayern, ran out in the game at Eintracht Frankfurt with a armband in the colors of Ukraine. “Russia’s footballers and fans” are “not responsible” for Putin’s warmongering, he later said via Twitter: “But we can’t pretend that nothing happened.” The words take effect. The two potential playoff opponents Sweden and the Czech Republic had long since spoken out against a game against Russia. No matter where, no matter under what conditions. That wasn’t in it for her.
The silence of the Germans
Unlike the Bundesliga soccer club RB Leipzig. The Saxons, who belong to the portfolio of the Austrian right winger Dietrich Mateschitz, were drawn against Spartak Moscow last Friday in the round of 16 of the second-rate Europa League. From then on they shifted the responsibility for the games to UEFA. They had already had all Russian team games moved to neutral ground in advance, but had not yet decided to exclude them.
“We hope and trust that the conflict will be resolved peacefully as soon as possible. Regardless of that, we want to win against Spartak. We are the only Bundesliga club still represented in three competitions and want to get as far as possible in all of them, because our goal as still young The club is to establish ourselves in the top 20 in Europe in the long term,” said Florian Scholz, the commercial director of Saxony, on Sunday.
And coach Domenico Tedesco was of the opinion that a boycott “always hits the wrong people”. Neutrality where attitude was required. Leipzig missed them. They were about the Europa League, Poland and the other associations about the World Cup. They are also in the quarter-finals of the Europa League. “War in any form is unacceptable for us. We have always clearly emphasized this attitude. UEFA today banned all matches involving Russian clubs,” they said after the decision.
For a long time, little was heard from the German Football Association either. He was not among the associations that publicly joined the boycott of Poles. The currently leaderless DFB is too busy with the election campaign for the upcoming presidential election next month. Not much could be expected, and even less could be heard. It didn’t really surprise anyone. The criticism remained strangely silent. When it was over, the DFB welcomed the decision and said it was relieved “that a joint decision has now been made worldwide in agreement with FIFA.”
Schalke and Gazprom
Schalke 04, on the other hand, caught the eye of the often very excited public early on. It’s no different in sport than in politics: far-reaching decisions should be announced within a few minutes. The fact that this is taking longer, too long for the public hungry for the consequences, could be observed on many levels in these first days of the war.
Financially stricken FC Schalke 04 reacted cautiously and clarified early on behind the scenes how they could succeed in breaking away from main sponsor Gazprom. He had only signed a new contract last summer, which should bring the royal blues 10 million euros per season. In the second division and at least twice as much in the first division. First they wiped the state-owned company off their chests and then off their future. Gazprom had accompanied the Ruhr area club for 15 years, and the deal was engineered by the powerful chairman of the supervisory board, Clemens Tönnies. He, meanwhile driven out of the club, brought himself back into play as a savior at short notice. But the calls went almost unheard.
UEFA didn’t want to either. Like Schalke 04 before them, they parted ways with the state-owned company Gazprom, which had elevated itself to become the unmistakable face of the Champions League over the past decade, bringing the association over 40 million euros a year and also sponsoring the 2024 European Championships in Germany. Not any longer longer. History on this Monday, which is also historic for football. Sport has fallen into the hands of autocrats and dictators.
The consequences now drawn from Russia’s war must lead to a long-term purification process. The reaction to the war in Russia and the liberation from Gazprom’s shackles can only be the beginning. Also on Sunday it became known that former DFB President Theo Zwanziger was said to have been processed using CIA methods by the upcoming and highly controversial World Cup host Qatar. A little side note in these war days. One that football should not ignore.