It Gets Dicey Out There

This past weekend, club teams have been on break in favor of international friendly matches. At least, they were friendly in parts of the world. In Europe, international squads have already started playing games that matter: qualifying group games for the Euro 2016 (Think World Cup, but just European teams).

One of the matches that was played over the weekend involved two teams that people probably don't pay attention to unless you live there. This match was Serbia against Albania in Serbia. Now you see what I mean? It's not a heavyweight matchup or anything, but these are two countries mean a lot to each other.

Evidently, they hate each other.

Serbia and Albania have had international conflict since the Yogoslavian wars and one of the key disagreements was when Albania decided to recognize Kosovo as an independent nation, while Serbia criticized Albania for instigating conflict and not recognizing national borders.

Albania also lead an uprising against the Serbs behind Isa Boljetini in 1912 which led them to become an independent nation. 

So there has been a decent amount of unrest between these two, and Albania's team had not visited the Serbia stadium for a game in decades.

Like, since 1967.

So nothing could go wrong in a qualifier soccer game right?

...Right?

Well, nothing exactly went wrong for the first 40 minutes of the game. Sure, there was extra security and a lot of flares going off, so it wasn't a safe situation, but nothing drastic happened.

Then, in the 41st minute, a flare was thrown on the field, so the game was stopped to clear it.

Then, a mini- drone appeared flying over the stadium, hanging an Albanian flag beneath it.

It approached the ground, and as the flag came down, a Serbian player grabbed it.

...And proceeded to be attacked by multiple Albanian players, starting an inter-team brawl in the middle of the field.

It gets worse.

The refs decided the game should be paused, and stopped the clock, just in time for supporters in the stands to get in fights with a) each other and b) the security at the game.

Multiple supporters of either side stormed the field and fought there.

Then the refs decided that, to the surprise of no one, the game was...

Wait for it...

...Not safe to continue.

...So they cancelled the rest of the game.

As Albanian players ran off the field they were pelted by anything the Serbian supporters could find.

Then the Serbian players were harassed by any Albanian supporters that weren't actively in a brawl.

Serbia is making the case to UEFA that they should be awarded a 3-0 win by forfeit, while UEFA is determining whether the game should be played again.

Now, I'm not sure if it's just me, but this is not a game that needs to be played. No one wants to see each other after this. It's not safe to try this again, especially if for some reason they allow it to be played in Belgrade again.

However, in the realm of less important things, Serbia simply cannot be awarded a win here. Call it a draw, get apologies for both sides, fine Serbia, and move on.

This is just another example that, believe it or not, politics, unrest, and racism/ radicalism make their way into soccer more than any other sport.

And it shows.

The game was tense before anything happened. This really isn't a game that should even be scheduled. The higher powers need to recognize here that if there is tension between nations, it shouldn't be played.

I'm not talking Germany and Poland, that game was played without a problem.

I'm thinking if somehow Russia and Ukraine were scheduled to play. That would be asking for trouble. And UEFA needs to realize that there is more here than just soccer: they try to say they know that, but they don't show they recognize it.

It gets dicey out there.