Free Republic

Anti-Semitism has been rampant in Holland, but a new incident has taken the Jew hatred to new levels as Dutch soccer fans chanted anti-Semitic slogans during a match on Sunday, calling for Jews to be burned and sent to gas chambers. Dutch police have launched an investigation, after video footage captured fans belting out the anti-Semitic slurs and clapping during FC Utrecht’s 1-1 draw with Ajax, reports The Independent. Dutch media revealed the chants included “Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas,” and a longer one filmed by someone in the stands and viewable below, in which the fans roared “my...

I'm not a soccer fan, but I am a big fan of humor and well done parody. If this doesn't make you laugh, nothing will! (I clicked excerpt to make the link easy)

Russia's Euro 2016 qualifier in Montenegro was abandoned after multiple violent incidents in Podgorica on Friday. Just seconds in, Russia goalkeeper Igor Akinfeev was struck in the back of the head by a flare thrown from the stands at Stadion pod Goricom. While the teams played on, a second incident during the second half led to the abandonment. Roman Shirokov had a penalty saved by Montenegro goalkeeper Vukasin Poleksic in the 66th minute. The ball went out for a throw-in, which Dmitri Kombarov went over to take – only to refuse to when he appeared to be struck by an...

A teenager has been arrested on suspicion of sending a racist tweet aimed at Arsenal striker Danny Welbeck. SNIP The 15-year-old boy SNIP

Multiple sources say it's a done deal that World Cup 2022 will take place in November and December of 2022 in Qatar. A FIFA task force will meet in Doha next week and make that recommendation, and the FIFA Executive Committee is set to make the decision final at its meeting in Zurich next month.

Fifty four years after a Douglas DC-3 crashed in Chile’s Andes – killing all 24 people aboard, including members of a Chilean soccer team and three referees – a team of mountaineers discovered the remains of the crash. The 1961 LAN 301 air crash was deemed at the time one of the world’s major air disasters involving athletes – surpassed maybe only by the 1972 Uruguayan plane crash that stranded members of a rugby in the high Andes. The plane’s whereabouts has been one of the great unsolved aerial mysteries.

**SNIP** What caused the violence wasn't immediately clear. Security officials said Zamalek fans tried to force their way into the match without tickets, sparking clashes. Fans have only recently been allowed back at matches and the Interior Ministry planned to let only 10,000 fans into the stadium, which has a capacity of about 30,000, the officials said. Zamalek fans, known as "White Knights," posted on their group's official Facebook page that the violence began because authorities only opened one narrow, barbed-wire door to let them in. They said that sparked pushing and shoving that later saw police officers fire tear...

ISIS jihadists publicly executed 13 teenage boys for watching a soccer match. The young fans were reportedly watching an Asian Cup match between Iraq and Jordan on TV last week when they were caught by the militants in the Iraqi city of Mosul, which ISIS, or the Islamic State, controls. The group of teens was executed in public by a firing squad that used machine guns, according to Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently, an activist group that exposes ISIS atrocities. Before the kids were killed, their “crime” was announced over a loudspeaker, reports said. “The bodies remained lying in the...

ISIS Execute 13 Football Fans By Firing Squad For Watching Iraq Play Jordan On TV in Islamist-Controlled Mosul By SARA MALM 19 January 2015 ISIS militants have executed 13 teenage boys for watching the Asian Cup football match between Iraq and Jordan last week. The young football fans had been caught watching the game on television in the Iraqi city of Mosul, which is controlled by the Islamic State. The teenagers were rounded up and publicly executed by a firing squad using machine guns, anti-ISIS activist group Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently reports. Horrifying: ISIS militants rounded up the 13...

ISIS jihadists publicly executed 13 teenage boys for watching a soccer match. The young fans were watching an Asian Cup match between Iraq and Jordan on TV last week when they were caught by the militants in the Iraqi city of Mosul, which the Islamic State controls, the Daily Mail reported. Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently, an activist group that exposes ISIS atrocities, reported that the teens were executed by a firing squad. “The bodies remained lying in the open and their parents were unable to withdraw them for fear of murder by terrorist organisation,” the group posted on its website....

A member of Team Zaryen plays soccer. Credit: Daniel Ibanez / CNA. Vatican City, Jan 10, 2015 / 02:32 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- After losing a leg during Haiti’s devastating 2010 earthquake, Wilfrid Macena became a prosthetic technician and founded an amputee soccer team--and says his life can’t be topped years after the disaster. “The process has really helped me because I was only welding before the earthquake. I never could have believed that I would be a technician making prosthetics and helping the children in Haiti,” Macena told CNA Jan. 9. “Every time they came to check our prosthetics, I...

Spanish soccer team FC Barcelona has reportedly decided not to renew its sponsorship deal with a Qatari group linked to the country’s royal family because of Qatar’s alleged involvement in funding Islamic extremist terrorist groups. Israel’s Channel 2 reported Friday night that Barcelona, arguably the world’s most popular soccer team, will not renew the deal, which has so far brought in close to $200 million, because of mounting concerns related to the gulf state’s involvement in financing terrorism. Israeli leaders have frequently charged that Qatar funds Hamas, the terror group that rules Gaza, and the TV report also cited alleged...

First leg dates: 17 February: PSG v Chelsea; Shakhtar v Bayern Munich 18 February: Schalke v Real Madrid; Basel v Porto 24 February: Man City v Barcelona; Juventus v Borussia Dortmund 25 February: Bayer Leverkusen v Atletico Madrid; Arsenal v Monaco Second leg dates: 10 March: Real Madrid v Schalke; Porto v Basel 11 March: Chelsea v PSG; Bayern Munich v Shakhtar 17 March: Atletico Madrid v Bayer Leverkusen; Monaco v Arsenal 18 March: Barcelona v Man City, Borussia Dortmund v Juventus

Funny penalties...greatest goalkeeper ever!

A Turkish football club has decided to issue a hefty fine for beards, after its chairman claimed some footballers look like students of imam-training schools. "I am 80-year-old and I shave every single day," Gençlerbirliği chairman İlhan Cavcav explained the reasoning of his club's decision to start issuing a fine of 25,000 Turkish Liras ($11,200) to any of its footballers with beards. "Man, is this an imam-hatip school? You are a sportsman. You should be a model for the youth," he added in an interview with the Doğan News Agency on Nov. 15, while complaining that that his own grandson...

Saturday’s round of Euro 2016 qualifiers are neatly broken up into five matches at Noon and five more at 245pm ET. Macedonia/Slovakia, Spain/Belarus, Switzerland/Lithuania and Montenegro/Sweden are still on the schedule, but let’s take a quick run through the matches that just finished up. There will be parties in Liechtenstein and San Marino as the minnows picked up points against ‘superior’ competition. The latter picked up its first result in more than a decade

Thirteen U.S. senators have signed letters to U.S. Soccer president Sunil Gulati and FIFA president Sepp Blatter urging them to support the use of natural grass fields at next year’s Women’s World Cup in Canada, SI.com has learned. As of now, all six WWC venues are set to have artificial turf fields. It would be the first time a senior men’s or women’s World Cup was not played on natural grass. A group of top women’s players from around the world, led by U.S. forward Abby Wambach and Germany World Player of the Year Nadine Angerer, has brought a case...

You can watch a video related to this article by clicking on the "Enza Ferreri Blog" link above Maybe the tide really is turning. I remember when, in the late '60s and the '70s, hardline socialist and communist groups were still struggling to get their message accepted in Europe and the West generally. They were a tiny minority then, and their agenda seemed very far-fetched and out-of-synch with ordinary people and mainstream views. It also looked liked it was going to remain that way. When, later on, I heard them screaming "Free Nelson Mandela", I didn't think it was going...

JOHANNESBURG (AP) — The goalkeeper and captain of South Africa's national soccer team was fatally shot when armed men broke into the house where he was staying, police said Monday. Senzo Meyiwa was killed Sunday after two gunmen entered a house in Vosloorus township near Johannesburg while an accomplice waited outside, the national police force said on its Twitter account. The three assailants then fled, according to the police service, which offered a reward of nearly $14,000 for information leading to arrests in the case. South African soccer club Orlando Pirates confirmed Meyiwa's death, saying in a statement that it...

Here are some of the best fan banners and displays from around the world.