Ireland-Israel, the match of endless controversy: bowed heads, mourning ribbons and now comes the spitting

After the tensions of the first match on the neutral field of Debrecen, the second act between Ireland and Israel for Group 3 of League B of the Nations League was played and again there was no lack of tensions for a match that took place mainly beyond the result and the actual sporting performance. At the Serbian stadium of Bačka Topola, behind closed doors, a draw was seen, but also new scenes that caused the controversy to continue, with the Irish once again refusing to shake hands with their opponents, keeping their heads down during the Israeli anthem, while the latter responded by playing with a mourning armband on their arm. There were also moments of tension, when at half-time the players and the benches clashed, amid harsh words, insults and spitting.

Everything degenerated at half-time, when Ireland went into the dressing rooms ahead thanks to a penalty goal by Tory Parrott. At that moment, the tension rose to a maximum, with Israeli players coming into contact with the Irish bench: fierce confrontations, an attempt at a fight, many words and even spitting directed at the Irish staff, who denounced everything to the UEFA delegates, but preferred not to comment after the match, confirming the “intimidating climate” in which the match was played, more a confrontation between two countries with obvious problems of a socio-political nature than between two football national teams.

After all, this was known after what had happened in the first leg and the attention was maximum. Ireland had requested and received that the match be played on neutral territory to avoid the more than expected riots in Dublin, while UEFA accepted the request, closing the doors of the Serbian stadium to the public: in a climate of surreal silence, the return match took place, which ended 1-1 thanks to the equalizer scored in the second half by the Israeli captain, Peretz. But the sport gave way to the entire socio-political context of a match that saw the same problems of the first leg repeated: Ireland repeated the same gestures, expressing all its opposition to Israel and its politics, again bowing their heads during the national anthem in Tel Aviv and not shaking hands with their opponents.

If in the first match it was the Irish national team that played with the mourning armband on its side, this time it was Israel that held it, while Peretz did the same thing as Moylan in goal: he removed the mourning armband, kissed it and pointed it at the cameras. If in the first match the gesture was dedicated to the memory of the victims in Gaza, in this case it referred to “in memory of those who were killed on October 7”, as Israel had requested, obtaining UEFA’s approval. But in the end, more than a football match, what remains is the trace of an unresolved confrontation between two states that have transformed a sporting event into a sad and harsh manifesto of their political choices and positions.