Aamer Anwar slams Slavia Prague boss amid racism storm
Lawyer Aamer Anwar has hit back at Slavia Prague boss Jindrich Trpisovsky after he reinforced a claim that his client Glen Kamara assaulted Ondrej Kudela after Rangers lost on Thursday.
The Czech club published a statement the following day that accused the midfielder of punching his alleged racist abuser.
Trpisovsky then said it was the worst incident he has witnessed in football and Anwar is appalled by his comments – mainly because it has emerged that Slavia’s Premysl Kovar may have heard the racist word used by his teammate [The Scottish Sun].
As quoted by The Scottish Sun, Anwar said, “The statement issued by Slavia Prague is beneath contempt and compounds their repeated failure to condemn the racist abuse of Glen Kamara by one of their own players, as well as fans.
“This statement by Slavia Prague’s manager smacks of desperation and it might have helped their cause had one of Slavia Prague’s players not been caught on an audio-recording confirming that Kudela had called Glen a ‘monkey’.
“As for Uefa it really is ‘time up’ for their ‘anti-racism tokenism’.
“What black players need is a clear robust message to be sent out to the footballing world that Uefa are genuine about eradicating the scourge of racism.”
Absolute farce
This entire episode has been a sorry state of affairs for Slavia Prague and Anwar is right to suggest they are desperate.
The alleged racist abuse, if true, was bad enough from Ondrej Kudela, but the reaction from his club is equally reprehensible.
Not only have they refused to acknowledge the possibility of their player abusing Kamara, but they have gone so far as to accuse our midfielder of assault.
They care little for the individuals involved and only about saving their own reputation.
If Uefa finds them guilty they simply have to be kicked out of the Europa League and banned for a duration.
They could not control Kudela’s words but they had every opportunity to handle this situation in the right manner but have repeatedly chosen not to.
Something at the clubs needs to change drastically and a Uefa punishment may be the only thing that produces a positive outcome, unfortunately.
In other Rangers news, Ryan Jack has suffered another injury setback that rules him out of Scotland duty.