Football in the midst of war
For us, war is far away because we are in a peaceful environment. For us, war can also be very close, thanks to the world's advanced electronic communication tools and Internet systems, we can look at decadent photos of battlefield ruins, hear the roar of assault rifle fire, and read front-line reports of war correspondents.
But we often can't see that between the ammunition on the battlefield and the broken corners of the city, there is a group of orphans who have wandered away because of the war, although they are often ignored, but they also have their own lives, their own joys and sorrows, their own football.
Even in the war zone, there is still football
True wanderers
When we think of Rangers, we always think of The Rangers Football Club, Scotland's football team, but in fact, this veteran team founded in 1872 has always been a rich and stable team, with many honors and popularity around the world - with more than 600 Rangers fan clubs in 35 countries around the world, it is one of the largest fan bases in world football.
And the club holds the record for the largest travel support in football's history, when an estimated 200,000 Rangers fans arrived in Manchester City for the 2008 UEFA Cup final. [1]
Scottish Rangers logo
However, the same regional level football giants, some teams have had to become the real rangers team because of the war.
The Donetsk Miners in Ukraine is the representative of this team, which since its establishment in 1936 has been a representative team of workers in the Donetsk region, fighting for the city's honor. Especially after the 21st century when Ukraine's top billionaire Renato Akmetov joined the team, the strength of this team has made a qualitative leap and began to gradually become a giant team.
Since 2002, The Donetsk miners have won 13 of the 20 league titles, making them the new representative of Ukrainian football.
After the 21st century, the Donetsk miners gradually took over the position of Dynana in Kiev
When Russian President Vladimir Putin announced in his speech on February 24, 2022 that he recognized the Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic as independent states, the Donetsk miners immediately became the focus of football.
But in fact, this team from Donetsk has actually become a wanderer in Ukrainian football as early as 2014 .
In 2014, a serious political crisis broke out in Ukraine, armed conflict broke out between armed groups in eastern Ukraine and Ukrainian government forces, and the Donetsk Basin fell into war.
The Donbas Athletic Stadium, the home of the Donetsk Miners, was hit by two large-scale explosions, which caused damage to the northwest side of the stadium, and the communication equipment, energy center, equipment area and other serious damage. [2]
The Donbass Arena, which cost 400 million yuan, was destroyed by war
The destroyed Home Team of Shakhtar Donetsk had to temporarily move away from their hometown to rent stadiums in other cities to maintain their game mission, and began an eight-year wandering journey.
In fact, however, the miners did not intend to move away from their hometown at first, they were rooted in the city of Donetsk, and once they left here, they became rootless wood and water without a source.
But this team doesn't just belong to local players and local players: as many as 10 foreign players refuse to play in dangerous conditions. So the team weighed the pros and cons, chose to leave, and has not returned since.
The wandering Donetsk miners first arrived in Lviv, then to Kharkiv, and finally to Kiev, and even had to share the home stadium with their old rival Dynamo Kiev, and the team's long-term home, attendance and fan stickiness continued to decline.
The Donetsk miners still want to remain united in the fighting
The American writer Ernest Hemingway wrote in his monumental book The Old Man and the Sea: "A man can be destroyed, but he cannot be defeated." ”
People encounter setbacks and tribulations, the body may be shattered, but the will and soul are more and more frustrated, and the extreme environment stimulates people's stronger potential.
The wandering Shakhtar Donetsk team was not defeated in this difficulty, and during the eight years of wandering, the team, which did not even have an independent home stadium, remained firm in Ukrainian football, winning four Ukrainian Super Cups, four Ukrainian Cups and four Ukrainian Premier League titles.
Honors during the Miners' Wanderings (Source: Live It)
In the protracted Crisis in Ukraine, the teams forced to wander are not just the Donetsk Miners. Among the turmoil in eastern Ukraine is the affected soccer team Luhansk Ole Gunnar solsk.
The name of this team (FC Zorya Luhansk) can also be translated as "Luhansk Dawn Team", since Solja is the embodiment of the goddess of dawn in Slavic folklore.
The history of the team dates back to 1923, when the workers of the Luhansk Steam Locomotive Factory founded the club.
In 1972, the club became the first to win the Soviet top league championship and was one of the three Ukrainian football "masters" that won the Soviet premier league.
Luhansk Ole Gunnarja
Due to its location near ukraine's eastern border, the club has a strong Russian cultural influence, and variants of the club's Russian name Zarya can be seen in many reports and logos.
It's just that today's teams are no longer near the border. After the escalation of the Conflict in Udon in 2014, the team moved its home stadium to the Slavtic Stadium in the northwestern city of Zaporozhye, where it remained until now, still having a certain competitiveness in the league.
So far, both Rangers teams are in the top five
The divisions brought about by the war are inevitable, but some teams still decide to stick to their homeland in the midst of the war.
The Mariupol team, also in the belligerent Donetsk Oblast, tried to stay at their home stadium, the Boyko Stadium, which was only 50 kilometers from the nearest firefight on the first day of the War between Russia and Ukraine.
However, the club solemnly stated that it would not give up its home stadium no matter what. [3]
Map of Ukraine
However, such a decision is not only brave, but perhaps also a helplessness.
Mariupol, which was only an amateur team in its early days, has only gradually become professional since this century, and does not have the stable financial support like the Donetsk miners.
Moreover, this season's Mariupol has been in poor shape, and so far it has ranked first in the league.
Wandering also needs capital, and in the face of war, more people have no choice and nowhere to go.
This team is already the penultimate number one (Source: Live it)
Lonely stranger
In the face of the war, it will not be disbanded, although it is wandering, but after all, the league is still there, the team is still there, the teammates are still there, and the fans are still there, which is already a blessing in misfortune for football players.
Football is one of the most popular sports of Syrians, with attendance of up to 50,000 people in Syrian domestic football matches.
However, after the outbreak of war, everything changed.
In 2011, the Syrian civil war broke out in full swing, and with the participation of multinational forces, the land was transformed from a rich West Asian country into a ruined war ruin. The Syrian football league has been wiped out.
In the Syrian civil war, at least 200 football players were forced to leave their homes, and even more players were killed. Some players have been killed by extremist groups for playing football, while others have been killed by opposition forces because of political differences.
In 2012, the Syrian team was disqualified from qualifying for the 2014 Fifaccia World Cup in Brazil due to various problems arising from tensions in Syria. [4]
Syrian football is fraught with disasters
In the midst of the crisis, despite the suspension of the league, Syria is still trying to continue the national sports cause, including football. In 2016, for example, when government forces took control of the Aleppo strip, they moved the training camps of several national teams to allow athletes to train under the protection of the troops, including football teams.
And those players who can still have a career in sports are still lucky, and more footballers have to give up their careers or become refugees. Yadu, who used to captain the Syrian U-16 national team, trained football in Germany as a refugee.
Syrians who have lost their country use football to express their national feelings
These Syrian players who have left their homes are one lonely foreigner after another, displaced and destroyed, but they still look forward to returning home and serving the motherland.
For them, football is not just football, but their connection with their hometown and compatriots.
In 2016, the Chinese national football team lost to Syria in Xi'an, and only 6 of the 23 players in the Syrian national football team played in the Syrian league, and the rest all drifted abroad.
It is hard to imagine that without football, these flesh-and-blooded foreigners who have to leave their hometowns can find their gradually lost national enthusiasm through what? And through what can we unite again?
The war has made Syrians more united
"When I started my career, my whole family came to the pitch to cheer me on, it was a huge family. At that time, the stadium was full of people.
Just two years ago, however, war broke out. In two years, the streets where I played as a child have been in ruins, the stadium has been destroyed by artillery fire, and some of the friends I used to play with have died in the war.
I look back on the past and wonder which of the peace of the past or the war of today is real. I pray every day that the war will end the next day when I wake up..."
Khatib, a Syrian player who used to play for Shanghai Shenhua, recalls his past football experience.
He was one of the first Syrian footballers to go abroad, and at the time of the outbreak of the Syrian civil war, he played in Kuwait and thus avoided the baptism of war.
Shenhua player Hattib
Hattib's hometown of Homs, located in western Syria, is an inland city and a transportation hub in the Mediterranean Sea, the third largest city in Syria, and a historic ancient city. In the War in Syria, it was reduced to a war zone and was severely damaged.
Hattib also suffered a serious psychological blow from the war, announcing his retirement from the national team and not returning until 2017.
Saleh is also a well-known Syrian footballer
Saleh is the captain of the Syrian national team and the bitter leader of the Chinese national team.
He was not one of the first players to leave Syria, and when the Syrian civil war broke out, he continued to play in the Syrian domestic league until 2013, when he left his hometown to play in Kuwait. In 2017, he was introduced by Henan Jianye and became a foreign aid in the Chinese Super League.
Saleh attending the tournament launch
In fact, Henan Jianye and Syria have a certain fate, this team's past foreign aid Neto, once the Syrian league and cup double champion, and Saleh is the captain of the Syrian national team.
One of the two of them witnessed the glory period of Syrian football, and the other witnessed the lonely period of Syrian football.
Saleh rarely gives interviews to reporters, and even when he does, he never talks about war-related topics.
On Saleh's birthday on May 20, Henan Jianye fans gave him a cartoon portrait of himself in a Jianye team uniform, with an iconic beard and a logo with the words "World Peace" in his hand. Saleh posted a picture on his profile that it was his favorite gift, which shows saleh's desire for peace in his heart. [5]
This painting is Saleh's favorite gift
On April 15, 2018, Saleh announced on Ins that he had terminated his contract with Henan Jianye. On the same day, the united States, Britain, France and the three-nation coalition launched a joint bombing of Syria, which increased regional tensions and caused mass casualties.
For Saleh or Khatib, they were lucky enough. The best soccer team in their hometown of Syria, with an average monthly salary of only $200 (about 1,359 yuan), is already a higher-paying industry in Syria, not to mention the mediocre grassroots teams.
If the league championship is won, the champion team will have a prize of 10,000 US dollars (about 67,970 yuan), which is not an order of magnitude compared with the Chinese Super League in those years.
Syrian players have low incomes
A little luckier than the two of them is Dortmund star Dahoud, who was born in Syria in 1996 in Almouda, Syria, and was taken to Germany by his parents when he was only nine months old, and he has never returned to Syria.
Although his grandfather is still in Syria, Dahoud did not experience the most brutal moments of the Syrian civil war, and his football career has developed well in Germany.
He also looks forward to the restoration of peace in his long-isolated hometown: "When that area is finally shrouded in peace, I also want to go back and see where my roots are." ”
Syrian-German player Dahud
However, the perennial life in Germany has made Dahoud already a very European German, and he no longer has the strong sense of foreignness of Hatib and Saleh.
Precious football gifts
War destroys everything, but war can't erase football.
Above the ruins of the war, amid the gunfire, football is still going on.
The BBC reporter described the football stadium he saw in Syria this way: "The surface of the plant is very rough, not as smooth as the grass, so the first half of the game is often interrupted by injuries to the players. The stadium of the game was uneven, and there were even traces of bomb craters left by landfills. ”[6]
Such poor hardware conditions can not prevent the hosting of football matches.
Syria's football hardware is poor
A BBC reporter once described a football story in a refugee camp on the border between Syria and Jordan:
A professional athlete for al Majd club in Syria's domestic league before the war broke out, the refugee Karaf was forced to interrupt his professional football career after the war broke out and fled with his family to the Zathari refugee camp.
But he is still reluctant to give up football, leaving the camp every two weeks to cross the border to Jordan to train a football team, and volunteering without asking for anything in return.
In fact, there are football enthusiasts in refugee camps around the world. For them, football is not just an entertainment toy, but a motivation to live.
Football in refugee camps
We always ask what football really means.
In fact, the answer is very simple - football can be used as a part of life, not only to fill the gaps in life, but also as the wonderful life itself. Football is also the fuel of life, pushing many people's lives to continue.
Football in the battlefield
Someone said: "Football is higher than life and death." This sentence does not mean that the winning or losing of a football game is more important than the existence of life, the true connotation of this sentence is —
Football can transcend the choice of life or death, it makes the will of the living more tenacious and better, it gives those who do not want to live to the hope of continuing to live, it takes out the spiritual essence of the dead, carries it forward, and lets them live forever in another way.
This is the answer to football, this is the gift of football to mankind, this is the most essential part of football culture.
Resources:
[1] Wikipedia "Rangers F.C." entry
[2] Fan Xu and Li Jinrui, "Europa League Champions who can't go home: The Donetsk Miners Football Team 8 Years of Wandering can't Hide Their Glory", 2022.2, Red Star News
[3] Snow Edge Garden, "Football under the Smoke of Gunfire, The Departure of the Third Team of the Ukrainian Super FireLine", 2022.2
[4] The War Story of Syrian Football: Why Did Syria Achieve So Well in International Competitions? ,2021.4,NetEase
[5] Richard Conway and David Lockwood, "Afternoon Tea: A Pillar of Syrian Football grown in a crater, 23 million pillars," June 2017, Tencent Sports
[6] Arima Sports, "Don't Let Syrian Football Be a Fig Leaf," 2018.4, Sina Column
Pay attention to see through football, this is an account with feelings and temperature~