FOOTBALL CUP
AND EURASIAN POLITICS:
Episode of flood
So the World Cup itself went to Spain which needs some positive
things so much. The die is cast and there is no way back
even if those Dutch guys are right about Mr. Referee Wabb’s miss-watches.
But the geopolitical context of contemporary sports is much wider.
And these battles never stop.
So the World Cup itself went to Spain which needs some positive
things so much. The die is cast and there is no way back
even if those Dutch guys are right about Mr. Referee Wabb’s miss-watches.
But the geopolitical context of contemporary sports is much wider.
And these battles never stop.
Some Russian-language media has tried this week to reveal the scandal
which had forced Lord Triesman to leave the chairman position in the
Football Federation of England in May. LifeSports journal and NEWSru
site have thrown the headlines about anonym Dutchmen who "accused Russia
in being responsible for their national team’s loss in the football
World Cup final". The matter is that on 16 May 2010 the Mail
on Sunday revealed that certain Melissa Jacobs had secretly tape-recorded
Triesman in a restaurant. He made comments about alleged bribery
attempts by Spain and Russia of referees in the 2010 FIFA
World Cup. Triesman said, "There’s some evidence that the Spanish football
authorities are trying to identify the referees ... and pay them."
It was announced that he was to ’quit’ both the FA and England’s
2018 bid. That was another Britain sports official who stepped down from
his position "surprisingly" at a same time when the whole British
government resigned and the previous political course was changed. And the
latter fact probably appeared to be the main thing for British media
and authorities. And for non-British too, because the incident had disappeared,
at least from the front pages, rather fast.
And now the above-mentioned tabloids, citing no sources
of information, try to make a fuss around it once again.
Why?
Using Web-search, I wasn’t able to find any British, Dutch
or Spanish, not even any American or European serious media
publications on the subject — nothing but two Russian web-sources.
To be more exact, the only one — NEWSru.com. This
is a popular "hot" news and "gossip" news site supplying a ring
of other sites with this sort of information. And probably nobody
would have noticed LifeSports insinuations without the publicity that NEWSru
had given them. So what’s the reason for a Russian site
to publish such unverified informburgers?
Frankly speaking, NEWSru.com can’t be regarded as the true Russian
media. It was founded by Vladimir Gusinsky, Russian media-oligarch,
who preferred to leave the country after Mr. Putin’s becoming
a president. He was asked to pay taxes, his political influence
was really pushed down — so Mr. Gusinsky, after spending some time
in a Spanish prison (by the way), migrated to Israel. And
the main service of NEWSru.com (imagine that!) is Israeli too, though
it has a rather popular Russian one.
In contrast with Britain or, for example, USA Israel hasn’t yet been
"overloaded". Such hawks as Bibi Netaniaghu still occupy important
positions in its leadership. They are really disturbed by the fact
that too much players interfere in their affairs with Palestine and that
Eurasian space has its own tendencies for stability. With those SCO, EurAsEC
and new Turkey even such wrongdoers as Iran couldn’t be attacked
without causing a revolt, you know. And what does Russia do? It holds
a kind of informal CIS summit in Crimea, with the help
of much more friendly and cooperative new Ukrainian president. And the
presidents of the post-Soviet states, among other points, have reached
an agreement to collaborate in the field of organizing Euro
2012 in Ukraine and Poland and Olympics 2014 in Russia,
as a symbol of growing regional integration and development,.
That will be a good experience before probable Football World Cup
in Russia in 2018. And what would it mean, 2018 Football World
Cup in Russia? It would mean Eurasian stability. No bombs
on Iran, Mr. Netaniaghu.
So what do we have? We have hawks in Israeli
government who don’t like peaceful self-concerned Eurasia. We have
an ex-Russian oligarch who doesn’t like "Putin’s Russia" and not
a long time ago agreed to receive a Spanish citizenship
in order to avoid deportation into Russia (Spain doesn’t extradite
its residents to other states). And we have a kind
of attempt to show, for one instance, what is "the price"
of Russian sport cups hospitality and, for other instance, to press
upon the (rather weak) Spanish government which probably would be really
glad to avoid an honor to organize the 2018 World Cup
in face of hard economic time. And unconfirmed talks about unknown
Russian officials with big bribes in their pockets pursuing Russian
authorities’ interests start every time when someone loses.
This time for some reasons the provocation wasn’t among top news, at least
for now. But that is only one episode of tough guys’ geopolitics.
Football does matter but who cares?
Ignat Kuskov
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