Racist abuse halts England’s 6-0 victory twice
SOFIA: England manager Gareth Southgate said his side made a statement by deciding to complete a 6-0 Euro 2020 qualifying win over Bulgaria after the match was twice halted by racist chanting.
The visitors led 2-0 through early goals from Marcus Rashford and Ross Barkley when play was first stopped and an announcement made to supporters that the game could be suspended if offensive chanting continued.
Once restarted, England quickly made it 3-0 through Barkley before a second stoppage as Croatian referee Ivan Bebek held discussions with players and coaching staff from both sides.
Raheem Sterling then netted twice either side of half-time before Harry Kane rounded off the scoring to take England to the brink of qualification.
“We know it is an unacceptable situation,” Southgate said. “We’ve managed to make two statements really by winning the game, but also we have raised the awareness of everybody to the situation. The game was stopped twice and I know for some people that won’t be enough, but we were as a group on board with that process.”
In a statement, the English Football Association said their players “were subjected to abhorrent racist chanting” and called on UEFA to investigate immediately.
Tyrone Mings was one of those targeted on his England debut. The Aston Villa defender believed that stopping the game did have the desired effect of reducing racist abuse in the second half. “The correct steps that were taken definitely helped,” said Mings. “We made the decision at half-time to come out and play the game which we thought was the right decision. If anything else happened, we would have taken appropriate action.”
A comprehensive victory was the perfect riposte for Southgate’s men to their shock 2-1 defeat at the Czech Republic on Friday and opens up a threepoint lead at the top of Group A.
However, the focus was again on the stands as another England match blighted by racism from opposition fans.
After several English players suffered racist abuse in a qualifier away to Montenegro in March, Southgate had prepared his side to follow UEFA’s threestep protocol for reporting racist incidents that can lead to matches being abandoned.
A section of 5,000 seats at the Vasil Levski National Stadium was already closed for the game after racist incidents during games against Kosovo and the Czech Republic in June.
“I have to say the officials were onto everything very quickly,” added Southgate.