Barcelona football club player Daniel Alves da Silva, who is also known as Dani Alves, lately took a bite at racism after a Villarreal fan threw a banana at him.
On Sunday, April 27, the Brazilian born Alves was playing for Barcelona in the city of Villarreal when an opposition fan threw a banana at Alves. The Brazilian player took the insult sportingly and peeled off the banana, ate it and continued with his game.
Alves says that he has been in Spain for 10 years and has faced different types of racism from football fans of rival teams. However, this is the first instance that a banana has been thrown at him.
Barcelona was trailing behind by 2-0 but the team made a comeback soon. The 65th minute of the game saw an own Villarreal goal taking the score to 2-1, which gave Barca a ray of hope to win the game. Within around 10 minutes, Barca was given a corner kick and Alves went to take the kick. As he neared the corner, Villarreal fans threw things at him which also included a banana. Alves without any hesitation went forward picked the banana and ate it.
Just within a few minutes another own goal took the score to 2-2 and a goal in the 83rd minute by Lionel Messi gave Barca a lead of 3-2 and the team eventually won the game.
In January 2013, Alves was also racially abused by a few Real Madrid fans at the Estadio Santiago Bernabéu. The fans jeered at him and passed racist comments.
"I did not think about leaving the pitch, but it bothers me," said Alves after the clash with Real Madrid in January 2013. "It does not just happen at [the Bernabéu]. I go through this constantly in all the grounds I go to. It is a shame, as fans can like you or not, and there can be heated moments within games, but the crowd should just support their own team."
Alves may have taken the racist incident sportingly, which did not affect his game. However, racist incidents at Spanish football stadiums are a frequent occurrence. Spanish football authorities should increase their efforts to stop such racial abuse to keep players at ease and at the same time preserve the honor of the game.
