10 Things Sepp Blatter Wants You To Forget

Another in the long and gloried list of Sepp Blatter foot-in-mouth moments occurred in 2011, back when English football was mired by two major racism scandals. Whereas the English FA saw fit to punish John Terry and Luis Suarez with four game and eight game bans respectively for their racial misdemeanours, were Sepp Blatter in charge then he would have had abuser and victim shake hands instead. Said Sepp at the time:

"There is no racism [on the field], but maybe there is a word or gesture that is not correct. The one affected by this should say this is a game and shake hands."

The backlash from footballers and anti-racism campaigners wasn’t enough to deter Sepp Blatter from making further questionable comments on the sensitive subject of race. In an instance in 2013, racist chanting from a faction of Pro Patria fans during a preseason friendly led to AC Milan player Kevin-Prince Boateng leaving the pitch in protest. Blatter’s response was to accuse Boateng and his teammates of ‘running away’.

Though of course it’s hard to know what exactly the right solution is to tackle racism in football. Sepp constantly talks of a zero tolerance approach, yet sees fit to fine offending clubs or countries derisory sums that clearly act as no deterrent. If only they could all just shake hands and be done with it.