Patrick Barclay: Nicolas Anelka cannot get away with this act of revulsion

 
Laurie Rampling
2 January 2014

Seldom, during the 17 years between Nicolas Anelka’s arrival at Arsenal and his two-goal contribution to a draw by West Brom at West Ham last Saturday, did the recurrent cynicism about him seem persuasive.

True, he had kept changing clubs, completing a century of League appearances only at Chelsea, but everywhere — at Bolton as at Real Madrid — he had appeared to give value for money with his goals and general comportment.

Followers of the French national team, for which he ceased to play after swearing at manager Raymond Domenech during the turbulent World Cup sojourn of 2010, might beg to differ, but the rest of us had seen a quiet and earnest footballer with no record of being photographed emerging cross-eyed from a nightclub.

All of this changed with his goal celebration at Upton Park — the quenelle — or, to be more precise, the absence of an immediate and proper apology for a gesture that a wide variety of French sources explained to be anti-semitic, a sly twist on the traditional Nazi salute.

Anelka gave an unconvincing justification for it. He said he was showing support for his friend Dieudonne M’Bala M’Bala, a supposed comedian. The reason why this humourless nitwit needed support, however, was that opponents of his taste in jokes — think gas chambers — include the French Government.

If you want a laugh, you’d be better trying Anelka than Dieudonne. The striker argues that his pal is against the establishment rather than Jews and that the quenelle symbolises a protest against “the system”, thus suggesting that, although even a footballer cannot fool all of the people all of the time, this one can easily fool himself.

But Anelka, noted as he is for legitimate use of “the system”, cannot be that stupid. Nor can the board of West Brom. They should be ashamed of not only leaving him available for selection while the Football Association work out what to do but letting caretaker Keith Downing use him during yesterday’s home win over Newcastle.

And what of the anti-racism campaigner Piara Powar, who pronounced that Anelka’s offence was less serious than those of John Terry or Luis Suarez? If Powar cannot see that it was greatly worse, and if he cannot see the difference between a public declaration and insults, however abominable, uttered during conversations intended to be private, he is more likely to be exacerbating problems than facilitating solutions.

There are, of course, many people young and simplistic enough to believe that an ethnic issue naturally involves skin colour or Islamophobia rather than its opposite.

There are even more, I sometimes worry, who lack the slightest grasp of the hideous section of twentieth-century European history that culminated in the aggregation of unspeakable atrocity now known as the Holocaust.

But you don’t have to be a Jew — and I’m not — to understand how innocent men, women and children across the continent might be alarmed if all the force at football’s command is not ultimately applied to Anelka and his gesture, assuming that his concept of contrition remains restricted to a promise not to use it again.

This story did not spread far and wide without reason. These people must be protected.

Upon hearing of what was alleged against Terry and Suarez, and upon noting the sanctions that followed (even if many considered them lenient), few of us believed anything as offensive could arise from the polyglot world known as the Premier League. We were wrong. And we now know why FIFA ban personalised goal celebrations.

The prohibition should be reviewed and, if necessary, tightened up as part of the process in which the FA are now engaged. But above all there should be revulsion against all that the appalling Dieudonne espouses.

If its expression were terminal and unequivocal — if we finally bid farewell to his apologist Anelka — that would be some gesture.

Tale of two old pros as Fulham get a kick-start

West Ham United's English midfielder Kevin Nolan (L) reacts after being sent off by referee Mark Clattenburg (not pictured) during the English Premier League football match between Fulham and West Ham United at Craven Cottage in London on January 1, 2014.
IAN KINGTON/AFP/Getty Images

Fulham are not out of the mire yet. Indeed, the first 23 minutes of their rainswept encounter with West Ham at Craven Cottage suggested that Rene Meulensteen’s team might be in for a thrashing almost as severe as at Hull a few days earlier.

The central defensive partnership of Philippe Senderos and Fernando Amorebieta, though it was to steady slightly as the match moved away from the visitors, induced palpitations. A little further up their field, Adel Taarabt seemed to be playing a game of his own.

But then two old pros came to Fulham’s rescue. Sadly for West Ham, one wore their colours and the other used to. Kevin Nolan could hardly be blamed for the brilliant use of the right leg with which keeper David Stockdale denied the visitors a second goal (though a finisher of the West Ham captain’s quality would have been expected to score) but his suicidal departure for kicking Amorebieta suggested that the armband ought not to be returned following his suspension.

Fulham will not always enjoy such luck and the sooner they have Brede Hangeland back to shore up that defence the better their survival prospects will be. In the meantime, so much depends on Scott Parker. The midfielder was magnificent against one of his old clubs. It was a reminder of how, in the 2010-11, he was voted Footballer Of The Year even though West Ham were relegated.

Might history repeat itself? Not likely, for no matter how well Parker continues to perform, the candidates for the football writers’ honour are led by an apparently unstoppable Luis Suarez, with the likes of Yaya Toure, Sergio Aguero and Aaron Ramsey challenging. It’s a vintage season, for all the dodgy defending exemplified by West Ham’s goal from a keeper’s clearance yesterday.

But it looks as if Fulham are entering into the constructive spirit of things and the best part of their game was the intelligence of the attacking play orchestrated by Parker and Dimitar Berbatov. At least Meulensteen’s senior players served him well. Nolan, by contrast, has done Sam Allardyce no favours.

Forget Cruyff, Greenwell made Barca great

The longest unbroken term as Barcelona manager was served by Johan Cruyff. But whose record did he break? It’s time to salute Jack Greenwell, born 130 years ago today.

Greenwell, the son of a Durham miner, played for Crook Town in the Northern League but in 1909 joined the amateurs of West Auckland for the inaugural Sir Thomas Lipton Trophy, an early attempt at a World Cup. Why the tea magnate Lipton had invited West Auckland is not clear but the Football Association had declined to nominate anyone and so Greenwell and colleagues journeyed to Turin to face the top professional sides of Italy, Germany and Switzerland.

They won not only this tournament but the next in 1911 and the following year Greenwell was signed by Barcelona. After retiring as a player he became the club’s first full-time manager and established them as the leading force in Catalan football.

On the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War he fled to Peru — and made the national team champions of South America. It’s a career worth celebrating.

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