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Japanese soccer player Yuki Nakamura quits Slovakian club due to racial abuse

Jan 31, 2013 Sports 4

Japanese soccer player Yuki Nakamura quits Slovakian club due to racial abuse

Japanese soccer striker Yuki Nakamura has quit his Slovakian club Rimavska Sobota saying his club and his teammates did nothing to support or protect him from the racial abuse targeted at him by supporters.

“It’s a real shame but I have come home because I have been subjected to racism at Rimavska Sobota and I can’t carry on living there,” Nakamura posted on his blog. The 25 year old, on loan from Czech side Viktoria Zizkov, said that fans would hurl racial slurs at him before and after games. When he told the club about it, they said there was nothing they could do about it. He decided he couldn’t continue living there and decided to just come home to Japan. He has previously played in Romania and the Czech Republic.

Other Japanese players have also experienced difficulties while playing overseas. Most recently in 2011, Lierse goalkeeper Eiji Kawashima was taunted by opposing fans with chants of “Fukushima, Fukushima” in reference to the nuclear disaster from the Great East Japan Earthquake. Racism in football is still a persistent, serious problem and FIFA president Sepp Blatter believes it is one of the biggest scourges in the sport. He believes points should be deducted from teams in cases of racial abuse. Kevin Prince Boateng of AC Milan, who also plays for the national team of Ghana, walked out of a friendly match against Pro Patria after fans didn’t stop their “monkey” chants, even after being called out by the stadium announcer. United State’s Jozy Altidore is also another recent victim of racist chants, during a Dutch Cup game for his club AZ. The referee wanted to halt the fixture after fans continued hurling abuse at him, but Altidore asked for the game to continue.

[ via World News Australia ]

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  • Bongo the Prdkha

    Hmm … It’s a shame that such a thing happened in the country I live. Perhaps this reflects primitivness of slovak football fans and players because here, where I reside no one has problems with Japanese. Several Japanese nationals even teach at school where I study and japanese language is a subject of great interest here. People only tend to have problems with Chinese who don’t speak Slovak nor English but live here. Of course there are many racist jokes here as in other European countries(at least in eastern and middle european ones) but these mostly involve gypsies and jews and I can understand why is that.

    • lila_rose

      Of course generally Japanese has no problem in Europe, definitively Japan is richer and safe country more than European countries, they don’t need to immigrate to gain their lives here, lol I believe that this is problem in football domaine and not specially in Slovakia… what a shame for those who blame people just because of the colour of skin… (sorry for my bad English)

  • Hachiro

    I wish that this would get more coverage in Japan itself and that the people in Japan open their eyes to the fact that they too as well are guilty of racism too.

    Many of us foreigners who live in Japan face racism daily in our lives and while it’s sad to say no doubt, there is no place in sports for racism.

  • Hara

    And, ofcourse, there is no racism in Japan.