Football was once again involved in a scandal due to political conflicts and xenophobic chants by the public. This occurred during the meeting between Rumania y Kosovo by date 5 of the UEFA Nations League. The match was suspended and the winning match was given to the local team after the visitor left the field of play in the 93rd minute. alleging that fans began chanting against their nation with racist insults.
The duel became transcendental to determine who finished first in Group C2 of the competition, in which Kosovo had to win by three goals to surpass its rival and remain at the top, with no date left to play. However, the game was going on without any movement in the result and everything indicated that it was going to end without goals. Until in time added, Amir Rrahmani and Denis Alibec had a dispute on the pitch, which led to a fight with some pushing.
Although heated tempers quickly calmed, The local public began to sing “Serbia, Serbia, Serbia” while showing the flag of that country and throwing different objects onto the field. This was in reference to the political conflict in Kosovo, which belonged to the Balkan nation until it declared its independence in 2008. While the Romanian goalkeeper, Florin’s Nitahe effusively asked for calm, he could not control the faction that was singing the song.
Immediately, the captain of the visiting team, Rrahmani, decided to leave the pitch and went to the locker room with all his teammates, accompanied by the coaching staff. As they left, some Kosovar soccer players began to make signs by joining their hands, forming a double-headed eagle. This is a nationalist gesture that is also linked to the political conflict between Albania and Serbia. Previously, there were cases like that of Xherdan Shaquiri and Granit Xhaka celebrating goals against Swiss with said posture.
“Enough! Kosovo is an equal member of UEFA and we demand our right to be treated equally. It is time to put an end to this lack of respect towards our country once and for all!expressed Amir Rrahmani once they left the stadium. In fact, it is not the first time that Kosovo comes into conflict with Romania, since in the qualifiers for Euro 2024, A year ago, local fans displayed a series of flags that read “Moldova is Romania; Kosovo is Serbia.” On that occasion, the meeting was stopped for more than 50 minutes.
What was the action of the UEFA authorities? Initially, the Kosovo dressing room was given 10 minutes of tolerance to return to the field of play. Given the forceful stance of the team not to return, regardless of the consequences and in order for actions to be taken to stop the lack of respect. That is why the organization decided that the main referee, Morten Krogh, should give the final whistle and that the visit would be disqualified.
For the moment, in the absence of possible resolutions in the next few hours, Romania won the match 3-0. However, this is not definitive, since UEFA will have to carry out an investigation into whether there was racist behavior on the part of the public and act accordingly.
In the event that this result is maintained and continues to stand, with one match left to finish the first phase of the UEFA Nations League, Romania leads group C2 with 12 points, ahead of Kosovo, which has nine points. With this scenario, the leader would be obtaining promotion to zone B, while the second will have to play a playoff to move up.
