FACING THE AUDITORS
Should football matches be interrupted when racist or homophobic insults are heard in the stadiums? While the debate stirred the sporting and political world for several weeks, Yannick Noah sees "a starting point". Guest of the show Face aux auditeurs, broadcast Sunday evening on Europe 1, the former tennis champion evokes his own memories and a problem he considers more global.
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"It's not a problem that comes from football, it's not a problem that comes from sport"
"You understand that these people who say bullshit, they leave in the street after," says Yannick Noah. "We are in a city of 10 million people, and then there are 50,000 people (in the stadium, ed ), about a hundred of whom say anything ... There, we talk about society. is not a problem that comes from football, it's not a problem that comes from sport, that it starts from there is very good, but there should be relays after.
And the champion to tell his own experience of racism in sport: "My first professional match, I played in Johannesburg (South Africa, ed ) during Apartheid, so I was badly barred (... And then in Alabama, (...) there were drivers who did not want to take me because I was a colored player, so I called Mom and I said, 'you know what, here I am She said, 'Well, but you told them you were born in Sedan?'
"We rather tried to laugh and find solutions"
"I was lucky to have an education where we tried to laugh and find solutions," Yannick Noah smiled. "It all depends on how you perceive it." Every time it happened to me, I wanted to laugh, I looked at the guy's face and I said, 'You've seen the face you've seen' But what are you talking about, man, if I can do something for you, I'm ready to help you, come and drink a beer, I'll calm you down. ' (...) I happened to do that and it was very enriching, because normally I return it.Normally, he changes his mind at the end.He said: 'no, it was not a real monkey'."