Juraj Vrdoljak of Telesport was convinced.  “I think half the population didn’t show up to work on the morning after the win against England.” The victory had inspired early shop closures, a feeling of rampant escapism. “Croatia is a country with a deep economic crisis.  Every day, life is really hard.  It’s full of bad stories and tough times.  There is lot of poverty.  A lot of people are emigrating.”

Members of Croatia’s football team have become national talismans of endurance, the shock troops of resilience and hope.  Ivan Rakitić, when he takes the field against France, will be playing his 71^st match of the season, the most than any top-flight player this year.  Luka Modrić remains unflinching in the midfield as the team’s general.  Domagoj Vida has been granite in defensive solidity.

Football teams can be held up as mirrors of the nations they represent. This sociological gazing can always be taken too far, a scholar’s fruitless pondering, but Croatia’s national side is instructive.  It was Dinamo Zagreb’s Zvonimir Boban who stirred matters with his heralded assault on a police officer engaged in a violent scuffle with fans in a match against Red Star Belgrade.  Croatian football was fashioned as a vehicle of protest and dissent against what was seen as a Serb-dominated federation.

In time, football kicks became shells and bullets in the murderous dissolution of Yugoslavia.  To this day, a legend stubbornly holds that the truculent Bad Blue Boys of Dinamo and the countering Deljie of Red Star precipitated the first shots of that war.

Starting with its current inspirational captain, the link between social ill and patriotic performance can be seamless.  When he finishes the tournament in Russia, Modrić will have to turn his mind back to his relationship with mentor and former Dinamo Zagreb executive Zdravko Mamić, a towering figure who finds himself facing a six-and-a-half year prison sentence for corruption and fraud.   From Bosnia and Herzegovina, he does battle with the authorities, attempting to avoid extradition after fleeing Croatia.

A bursting feature of the case mounted against Mamić involved claims of ill-gotten gains from transfers of Modrić from Dinamo Zagreb to Tottenham Hotspur in 2008 and Dejan Lovren to Lyon in 2010.  Modrić, it seemed, was implicated in signing an annex to his Dinamo contract, suggesting a 50-50 split of any future transfer fee.  What was significant was the timing – 2015 as opposed to any earlier dates.  Through his tenure, suggestions that Mamić had conducted a “silent privatisation” of the club were rampant, producing inflated transfer prices and a cult of acquisitiveness.

Modrić, having been billed as a star witness who initially supplied anti-corruption investigators with gold dust on Mamić’s penchant for cooking the accounts, notably in terms of pocketing millions of euros of the transfer fee, froze in the dock.  His memory, it seemed, had failed him; the contract annex was not signed, as he initially claimed, in 2015 but 2004.  This testimony was effectively rendered worthless.  Croatia’s captain now faces the prospect of a perjury charge that carries a possible sentence of five years in prison.

The Croatian Football association, in an official statement in March, was not having a bar of it, unsurprising given the powers that be within the country’s football hierarchy.  The body insisted upon “the principle of innocence and considers every person innocent until proven otherwise.”  It was also “deeply convinced of the correctness of Luka Modrić’s testimony before the court in Osijek, and especially because of Modrić’s behaviour since his first appearance for the Croatian U-15 team in March 2001 to date.”

While every inch the commander in the field, with his team keen to impress in their following, not all Croatian supporters are in the Modrić tent of fandom. The Bad Blue Boys have found themselves split in loyalties over the years, with some, such as Juraj Ćošić, forming a breakaway team, Futsal Dinamo. “Zdravko Mamić,” claims football sociologist Ben Perasović, “is a typical member of the new rich class.”  It is a class that continues to afflict Croatian football with their depredations, a looting tendency that is only now being reined in with mixed success.

The other team members have also shown this side to be rather prickly. Vida, and the now sacked assistant coach Ognjen Vukojević, were caught on film making comments supportive of Ukrainian nationalists in the aftermath of the side’s defeat of Russia in the quarter-finals.  FIFA’s benevolence prevailed, and the centre-back was permitted to play in the semi-final against England.

Such a background adds more than a touch of complexity, with all its discomforts, to the World Cup final against France.  Croatia’s team will not merely be facing their opponents on the field in a battle of wits and tenacity. Off it, pens and knives are being readied and sharpened, with prosecutions being prepared.

Even now, the team is being written off by the smug pundits of football orthodoxy, though with less disdain than before.  Three matches on the trot into extra-time suggest imminent exhaustion, a possible overrunning by a more refreshed French team. But desperation, in meeting talent, can be the most potent of elixirs.  This Croatian team has pushed the sceptics to the edge, and threatens to leave them there.  And with players like Modrić, adversity remains their closest companion.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.  He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne.  Email: bkampmark@gmail.com

Courtesy: https://countercurrents.org
 

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Ghana’s goalkeepers, Stephen Adams (L) and Fatawu Dauda ®, pray before a 2014 World Cup match. Robert Ghement/EPA

But the excitement and euphoria come with a unique challenge to the continent’s religions. Africa remains firmly devout across different faiths.

The Pew Research Center believes Christianity’s future lies in Africa. By 2060, more than four-in-10 Christians will call sub-Saharan Africa home, up from 26% in 2015, according to a new analysis of demographic data. The Centre also projects that sub-Saharan Africa will be home to a growing share of the world’s Muslims: that between 2015 and 2060, the share of all Muslims living in the region is projected to increase from 16% to 27%.

Religion, as a result, colours the way Africans see the world. Generally they don’t listen to politicians, because politicians are aloof and distant. They however listen to religious and traditional leaders because Africans believe that they are human representations of the divine horizon – the realm of truth.

But football challenges this and poses a religious dilemma in Africa. Citing its ability of uniting people of all backgrounds around a common cause, football has been described as “an African religion”. The sport demands attention. It requires devotion. It provides ecstasy. And this makes religious leaders nervous.

Religion and sports serve different purposes. Religion is meant to provide people with spiritual well-being, while sport serves aesthetic needs and entertainment. Nevertheless, they share common audience and cultural values, such as the value of fairness, discipline and commitment, which can be used to address African challenges.

A religious dilemma

There are many in the religious community who view football with contempt and disdain.

One issue of concern is that African football has the habit of attracting witchcraft. Individual players as well as national teams often subscribe to a religious technique known as “juju”, to imbue players with spiritual power before games, protect them from the rival spirit of their opponents, and more importantly, to influence the result. It’s not surprising that religious leaders have issue with this, seeing that players rely on the supernatural as a shortcut instead of hard work and discipline as constituted in their Holy Scriptures.
Secondly, for some believers football is threatening to become a religion in its own right. According to this block of believers, football demands allegiance and excessive emotional devotion.

Cristiano Ronaldo at the 2018 World Cup. Paulo Novias/EPA

The media use of hyperbolic religious imagery to portray sports stars adds to this negative perception of sports. This includes calling Lionel Messi “The Messiah” and dubbing Cristiano Ronaldo “a god”.

This sentiment is not entirely unfounded, when one considers the general background of the invention of sport. For example, Olympic games started in the temple of Olympia. On this occasion, ancient Greeks would offer sacrifices and took oaths with Zeus – the Greek high god. Given this, combined with the eager idolisation of modern stars, it’s not surprising that religious leaders are so opposed to the impact of the game.

A political space

For millions of people sport is an important dimension of their lives. Beyond entertaining them, it gives them identity and a sense of belonging. It offers them happiness and a rare sensation of ecstasy (depending on the result, of course). It’s also a source of catharsis in Africa. It creates an important distraction from the problems that ordinary people feel they can’t change.

And football is one of the rare places where an African child can find African heroes of international standing. Samuel Eto’o of Cameroon, Didier Drogba of Ivory Coast, Nwankwo Kanu of Nigeria, to mention a few, are individuals who gave African youth a reason to aspire.

Former Ivorian player Didier Drogba with young fans in Colombia, 18 March 2018. Ricardo Maldonado Rozo/EPA

Lastly, in many countries football is the only place in which Africans practice free speech without fear of retribution. They can criticise Arsene Wenger, chastise José Mourinho and thoroughly scrutinise Pep Guardiola, and they can go to bed without worrying about security forces raiding their houses in the middle of the night for being critical of those football managers.

Shared territory

Africa is a deeply divided continent along ideological, ethnic and territorial lines. Religion and football can produce consensus and conflict depending on the way they are applied.

They also have a unique ability of crossing borders and gluing people of diverse cultural, political and ideological commitments. While football can bring together people from different religious groups, religion can bring people together from different political and cultural backgrounds.

The are other ways in which the two can complement each other. In African culture an individual (and individuality) is hardly recognised. In order to be recognised and find their standing in the society individuals have to take on family or ethnic identity. For its part, football is about a balance between teamwork and individual creativity while religion is about serving fellow humans with a sense of individual accountability to their God. Both approaches can help people on the continent create a space for individuals to discover their talents.

Religion can also help football and other social spheres to transcend the momentary sensation and translate material success into something that offers sustaining satisfaction.

All this suggests that religious leaders and ordinary believers don’t need to feel threatened by the beautiful game. Instead of insularity and criticising sports from afar, they need to find a space in which they can weave together overlapping values for the service of society. There are a number of virtues they can apply from football to the way they live their lives. Africans need to re-imagine success not with the lens of “juju”, which promotes shortcut and trickery, but with the values of discipline, hard work and endurance that sports offer.

Mohammed Girma, Visiting Lecturer at London School of Theology and Research associate, University of Pretoria
 

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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It’s two in the morning, and thanks to Facebook, I am watching clips of Neymar rolling endlessly on the green grass of Spartak stadium. 

Unamused by the sport, I am not supposed to know Germany has been eliminated in the first round of a World Cup since 1938, but the internet won’t let me skip any information. 

Meanwhile, my newsfeed celebrates with “Russia Spain-re bhoira dise,” an uncanny resemblance to when our nation celebrates every victory in cricket. I feel disturbed, so I call someone out, and I am told, “Woah woah! Chill out, bro!”

So I am taking a chill-pill this World Cup, as I delve into why “France raped Argentina, and France is legend” is no joke.

First, the definition of rape encompasses sex with someone through their mental incapacity or physical helplessness. 

Nothing about rape is consensual. The good news is, participation in sports is. 

Sex is an intimate act between individuals willing to open up a part of their core selves to the other. Violating that privacy limits one’s ability to love and be loved. 

Now, if you are comparing that to Zidane headbutting Materazzi, reach out to me. I know therapists who can help you. 

Third, by definition, there is no fair play in rape. Rapists don’t rape because they can’t “get” sex elsewhere. Rapists rape to exert power. 

The term, when being used as an analogy to describe defeat, highlights how sportsmen are viewed today — big, strong, masculine, tough, glorious. And when you joke about rape, you give power to the rapists by contributing to a system that is becoming desensitized to the injustice around it. 

Sports, on the other hand, is a force for good. The Greek team was motivated to qualify, though their nation been has been reeling from economic hardships. We shed tears when Gotze held out Marco’s jersey as a tribute after winning the World Cup. 

Rape victims are never to blame, but the Argentina and Germany teams were the victims of their own arrogance and lack of teamwork. So, by saying that teams were raped absolves of their blame of massive sporting malpractice. 

I am talking about the way that we collectively think about rape.

We live in a world where sexual assault can be dismissed, condoned with jokes or excuses plastered across a T-shirt. 

People make statements about how rape culture is just a phrase that has been made up to make men look bad. But it’s the same rape culture that makes it so hard for male victims to speak out too, fostering the stigmatization of male rape victims as effeminate, impotent, or non-existent. 

Language evolves, but it cannot evolve without the culture going along with it. Asking people to be considerate and thoughtful about their language — particularly when it has the potential to cause very real damage to people with traumatic experience of the subject matter – isn’t a violation of the freedom of speech. 

It’s simply asking that we adhere to a socially codified system of kindness in which we consider how our words and deeds might affect other people. For people who have never experienced sexual violence, it is a luxury to be able to redefine those words to get a cheap laugh on social media. 

But perhaps the most important thing is this: When you joke about rape, when you take that word and make it yours to laugh about, to chide your friends with, you are telling everyone else that no one can trust you. 

And when you treat their objections as ridiculous overreactions that are less worthy of respect than the entitlement you feel, you are confirming to them that they shouldn’t trust you. 

Myat Moe Khaing is a Management Trainee at Grameenphone.

This article was first published on Dhaka Tribune
 

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