BaDa12 je napisao/la:Why I'm boycotting England - and supporting Bosnia and Herzegovina at the World Cup instead
This summer, I will be supporting World Cup newcomers Bosnia & Herzegovina. Now, I’ve never been to Bosnia. Or Herzegovina. But there is plenty there worthy of my support.
Always a multi-ethnic nation within the Yugoslav republic, the Bosnian war that raged from April 6 1992 to December 14 1995, tore the country apart. Over 100,000 people died in that time.
The siege of capital city Sarajevo was the longest in modern European warfare; the massacre of Srebrenica saw 8,000 Bosnian men, boys and pensioners wiped out by a Serb militia.
That’s the average weekly gate of my football club, wiped out as one. Even as a writer, I struggle to find the words.
Of course, from watching the Premier League, I know many of the team’s star names.
Stoke City’s Asmir Begovic was a refugee, his family fleeing the country, leaving all worldly possessions behind when he was just four years old.
Manchester City’s Edin Dzeko stayed: “My house was destroyed,” he told CNN last year,
“so we went to live with my grandparents. There were 15 people living in an apartment 35 meters square. We stressed every day in case somebody we knew died”.
Upon ceasefire, the striker would go on to play for one of the countries biggest clubs, Zeljeznicar Sarajevo. But only after the pitch was cleared of landmines.
There are other, less weighty, reasons I’m choosing to root for The Dragons, as they are known.
I often watch my local team Leyton Orient and watching Bosnian born Hull City goalkeeper/charismatic lunatic Eldin Jakupovic in his loan spell in E10 this season was an absolute delight, the song “Bosnia’s number one!” echoing around the ground, his pearl white smile of pride beaming back.
Not only that, but their national anthem sounds quite a lot like the theme tune to The Rockford Files.
But mainly, this summer I am becoming a Bosnia and Herzegovina fan, because their story of triumph over adversity – after two failures in previous play-offs, they qualified top of their group last October – embodies everything I hold dear about football.
There is no greed in their story. It is eleven bodies verses eleven bodies. All the potential for magic to subsequently unfold and history to be written.
And in Bosnia & Herzegovina’s case, it’s an opportunity to create a glorious new one, to leave the past behind, as much as they can do.
And, English, Bosnian, whatever - surely that’s something far more worthy of my support than an organization who wants to kill of one of things in my life most very dear to me?
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PREVOD:
Britanski novinar James McMahon napisao je tekst u popularnom britanskom listu "Mirror" u kojem navodi da bojkotuje nacionalnu selekciju Engleske, ali da navija za Bosnu i Hercegovinu na Svjetskom prvenstvu u Brazilu koje počinje 12. juna, prenosi Anadolu Agency (AA).
Iz protesta protiv namjere Fudbalskog saveza Engleske (FA) koji želi da uvede Ligu 3, odlučio je da javno obznani kako je, kako kaže, vrijednije i moralnije navijati za reprezentaciju BiH na Mundijalu u Brazilu.
"Ovog ljeta ću definitivno navijati za Bosnu i Hercegovinu koja prvi put učestvuje na jednom svjetskom prvenstvu. Nikada nisam bio u Bosni i Hercegovini, ali postoji mnogo razloga da podržim taj tim. To je uvijek bila multietnička zemlja koju je, nažalost, uništio strašan rat od 1992. do 1995. godine. Preko 100.000 osoba je poginulo u tom ratu. Opsada Sarajeva je najduža u modernoj evropskoj povijesti. U srebreničkom genocidu je ubijeno 8.000 muškaraca, a toliko ljudi sedmično uđe na sam jedan ulaz stadiona", napisao je McMahon.
Napominje kako su sadašnji igrači reprezentacije BiH mnogo propatili zbog rata koji je pogodio tu zemlju početkom 1990-tih kada su mnogi od njih morali sigurnost i bolji život potražiti negdje u svijetu.
"Prateći Premiership odlično poznajem mnoge zvijezde repezentacije BiH. Asmir Begović iz Stoke Cityja je, naprimjer, bio izbjeglica nakon što je njegova porodica morala pobjeći iz BiH ostavivši iza sebe sve što su imali. Edinu Džeki iz Manchester Cityja je također uništena kuće u ratu pa je za porodicom živio kod bake i djeda. Nakon okončanja rata Džeko je zaigrao za Željezničar, ali tek nakon što su teren očistili od mina", piše McMahon.
Na kraju ističe kako mu reprezentacija BiH pruža svu inspiraciju, kvalitet igre i zadovoljstvo u fudbalu o kojem je ranije sanjao.
"Navijat ću za BiH u Brazilu, jer nakon njihovog trijumfa nad svim nedaćama koje su ih pratile do sada, pa i dva neuspješna baraža, oni su sve u fudbalu o čemu sam sanjao. Oni su inspiracija kako da se ostavi prošlost iza sebe i da se krene u budućnost", kazuje ovaj Britanac koji dodaje kako će svim srcem i dušom navijati za, kako ih i sam zove, "Zmajeve".



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