How often, I wonder, does an ardent football fan ignore, or deny, the presence of any conditions that may cast doubt on the integrity of the sport we love, blinded by that same love?
I give you as a subject for that question one very simple example: Azerbaijan.
Azerbaijan are in Fifa's happy news because of their encouraging start
to World Cup qualifying. The recent minnows, rank outsiders have beaten
San Marino and Norway and drawn with the Czech Republic in their first 3
matches to sit second behind Germany in their group. Everybody loves
the underdog, right?
But how does the football world, not UEFA or Fifa, but the fans, feel about Azerbaijan? The country is run by, indisputably, a dictator. Transparency International listed Azerbaijan as one of the most corrupt countries in the world (119th out of 168) and the most corrupt in Europe. The dictator leader, Ilham Aliyev, was named by the investigative journalism NGO, The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, as corruption's Person of the Year in 2012.
Aliyev's government has also been accused by human rights groups of suppressing any criticism from within the country, jailing journalists and rigging elections. Aliyev and his family have also been amassing immense personal wealth through the country's oil and gas reserves.
And Azerbiajan has been buying it's way into the football community through it 's state owned energy firm Socar, now a major UEFA sponsor. This is from a Reuters report into Socar's sponsoring of Euro 2016:
"UEFA said it asked suppliers for Euro 2016 to pledge to respect U.N. principles in areas such as human rights, the environment and corruption.
Asked whether that also applied to sponsors and whether UEFA vets the companies it partners with, a UEFA spokesperson declined to comment, saying details of contracts were covered by confidentiality agreements." Conveniently.
Despite my original question I wonder, further to my original thought, if football fans would be as enthused by Azerbaijan doing an Iceland as they were by Iceland doing a Leicester. If we are so very ignorant to all the corruption that goes on in the football world why can't the Azerbaijan football story be as romantic as that of Iceland?
But how does the football world, not UEFA or Fifa, but the fans, feel about Azerbaijan? The country is run by, indisputably, a dictator. Transparency International listed Azerbaijan as one of the most corrupt countries in the world (119th out of 168) and the most corrupt in Europe. The dictator leader, Ilham Aliyev, was named by the investigative journalism NGO, The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, as corruption's Person of the Year in 2012.
Aliyev's government has also been accused by human rights groups of suppressing any criticism from within the country, jailing journalists and rigging elections. Aliyev and his family have also been amassing immense personal wealth through the country's oil and gas reserves.
And Azerbiajan has been buying it's way into the football community through it 's state owned energy firm Socar, now a major UEFA sponsor. This is from a Reuters report into Socar's sponsoring of Euro 2016:
"UEFA said it asked suppliers for Euro 2016 to pledge to respect U.N. principles in areas such as human rights, the environment and corruption.
Asked whether that also applied to sponsors and whether UEFA vets the companies it partners with, a UEFA spokesperson declined to comment, saying details of contracts were covered by confidentiality agreements." Conveniently.
Despite my original question I wonder, further to my original thought, if football fans would be as enthused by Azerbaijan doing an Iceland as they were by Iceland doing a Leicester. If we are so very ignorant to all the corruption that goes on in the football world why can't the Azerbaijan football story be as romantic as that of Iceland?
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