By Layli Foroudi, Amy Tennery and Julien Pretot
PARIS/NEW YORK, July 6 (Reuters) - Belgium coach Rudi Garcia’s description of Senegal as one of “those teams” that “tend to lose their tactical structure towards the end of the match” has reignited scrutiny of racially coded language at the World Cup.
Garcia made the remarks after Belgium’s last-gasp comeback against Senegal on Wednesday. In a statement posted on social media two days later, Garcia said he had been “referring to teams unaccustomed to managing
a lead in high-level World Cup matches” and that his comments could apply to teams from any region.
But critics said Garcia's remarks drew on a deeper history of racial stereotypes that have long cast Black players and African teams as naturally powerful and instinctive, yet tactically naive, emotionally fragile or unable to withstand pressure. For scholars and anti-racism advocates, the controversy has exposed a recurring fault line in football coverage: how language presented as tactical analysis can still carry old racial stereotypes.
“(It) is deeply racist in terms of the reproduction of racialized stereotypes about those teams, those teams, those African teams who lack the ability to control a game, to control themselves, and that comes from that colonial framework of the kind of animalistic tendencies that are projected onto Black people and onto Black populations,” said Ben Carrington, professor of journalism and sociology at USC Annenberg, whose research focuses on the intersection of race and sport.
Peter Alegi, a Michigan State University history professor who has written extensively about African football, said Garcia’s comments were “very disconcerting” because they echoed stereotypes African teams have spent decades trying to overcome.
He said Senegal’s late collapse risked reviving familiar assumptions, particularly if the tournament’s traditional powerhouses make it through to the finals.
“It’s going to undo a lot of the goodwill that African teams have accumulated, and all of the wonderful accomplishments,” Alegi said, pointing to South Africa’s hosting of the 2010 World Cup as an example of an African country's capacity to organise and shape the global game. “It takes one match, and that narrative is back.”
Numerous academic studies show that commentators more often describe Black players — both men and women — through athleticism, speed and power, while giving less attention to their tactical intelligence, technique or decision-making.
In one of the more recent studies, which focused on commentary during the 2018 World Cup, researchers at the universities of Leicester and Coventry found that 70% of praise given to Black players centred on physical attributes, compared to 18% of praise for white players. Less than 20% of praise for Black players centred on learned skills, character or cognitive abilities, compared to 73% for white players.
“The longstanding patterns within global media about race and sports are propelled and rationalized by two erroneous yet deeply held beliefs: racial essentialism – the idea that race exists as a biologically real category in which one race has traits that are essential to it — and biological determinism – that those essential traits biologically determine outcomes,” said Matthew Hughey, professor of sociology at the University of Connecticut and a specialist on race and sport.
He added that such stereotypes started to surface in the first half of the twentieth century, when Black athletes began to have sporting success.
PUNDITS UNDER SCRUTINY
Earlier in the tournament, German pundit and ex-footballer Bastian Schweinsteiger commented ahead of a Germany v Ivory Coast match that Germany needed to be "prepared for it to be unpredictable at times," and that Ivorians played "African football," which he characterised as "a bit unorthodox sometimes, a bit wild, not as tactical."
Ivory Coast coach Emerse Fae said that the comments could be described as racist - a claim that Schweinsteiger rejected, saying he was merely analysing a playing style.
Former Serbia footballer Rade Bogdanovic, who now works as a commentator for the Serbian public broadcaster RTS, apologised after making racist remarks about Black players during the June 21 match between Belgium and Iran. He questioned the focus and stamina of Belgium's Black players after the match ended in a goalless draw.
British sports journalist Leon Mann, founder of the organisation Black Collective Media in Sports, which advises broadcasters and helps young underrepresented people enter the industry, said Schweinsteiger's remarks were "ignorant and based on stereotypes", but that such moments should open conversations that lead to improvements in coverage and commentary.
"If a World Cup can challenge those perceptions, those negative stereotypes, then I'm glad we're having those conversations because people are not being given jobs because of terms like 'wild' and 'unsophisticated', not being placed in leadership positions, not being given jobs to feed their families, because of these ingrained views - not just in football," he said.
FIFA did not comment. Soccer's world governing body has launched initiatives in recent years to penalise acts of racism and develop educational initiatives on racism. It has established an advisory panel of former players from diverse ethnic backgrounds.
COMMENTS ARE 'DEMEANING' SAYS GOALIE
Black players at the receiving end of these comments describe the frustration of having their hard work brushed aside by commentators.
Briana Scurry's penalty kick save in front of 90,185 fans at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, helped the United States win the 1999 Women's World Cup, a moment that transformed the game for American women and girls.
But Scurry, who is now part of FIFA's 16-member Players' Voice Panel aimed at combatting racism, said her conversations with reporters in the 1990s typically revolved around her strength and athleticism rather than her intelligence or technical skill in goal.
"It's a kind of conversation around Black players that does not give them the credit of the fact that they have intelligence and skill. It's basically demeaning them and saying, 'Well, you're just athletic'," said Scurry, whose U.S. jersey is on permanent display at the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture. She said she sees parallels between how her style of play was described and how Black players' performance is still depicted in the media today.
Carrington, the USC Annenberg sociologist, said that FIFA has made efforts to combat racism in the competition thanks to pressure from anti-racist organisations, fan groups and players, but that there is still a long way to go in overcoming persistent stereotypes. FIFA did not comment.
"We need to have constant forms of anti-racism education and campaigns to make sure the beautiful game really is beautiful, not just a slogan that FIFA likes to use for marketing purposes, but a beautiful game in which diverse populations, different countries come together to celebrate sport and football," he said.
(Additional reporting by Karolos Grohmann, Sam Tobin and Nicholas P. Brown; Editing by Kat Stafford and Rosalba O'Brien)
