Tommy Martin: There can be no sympathy for sporting organisations scrambling to cut ties with Russia now

Go into business with Tony Soprano and your nice Italian restaurant is going to get burned

Thu, 03 Mar, 2022 - 07:05

PEOPLE have really stopped talking about Kurt Zouma’s cats.

Everything seems frivolous when contrasted with terrible gravity of war, but the cycle of flim flam that normally preoccupies sports fans can feel particularly inconsequential. No-one is really in the mood for an argument about VAR right now and updates from the Wagatha Christie trial have been in short supply.

Urgent calls for sporting authorities to cut ties with Russia in the numb days after the invasion of Ukraine began might have seemed like a sideshow given the seriousness of what was going on. As the rockets rained down on Kharkiv and Kyiv, who cared about the venue of the Champions League final or whether Lewis Hamilton would be scooting around the streets of Sochi?

But sport was where Vladimir Putin’s big con played out most prominently, so its cries of outrage were among the loudest. While Putin corrupted the complacent west by luring it into dependency on cheap Russian gas and oligarchic capital, sport saw the smiling face of the bloodthirsty bear. A world of easy marks unable to keep their hands out of the honey pot, the ‘all despots welcome’ policy allowed Putin to legitimise his thug kleptocracy by entwining it with some of sport’s greatest events, biggest clubs, and most prominent organisations.

Still, go into business with Tony Soprano and your nice Italian restaurant is going to get burned. The rush to sever Russian
influence in the last week is the embarrassed reaction of those caught with their trousers down. It is hardly surprising that the eternally shameless Fifa was among the slowest to feel the cool breeze of the new reality. Images of the odious Fifa president Gianni Infantino flouncing around with Putin at the 2018 World Cup will be a permanent stain on an already ragged reputation.

There can be no
sympathy for any of the organisations scrambling to cut ties with Russia now, acting as if the invasion of Ukraine was in some way out of character, like the startled neighbour interviewed on the TV news when it turns out the nice man next door was a serial killer.

Putin’s true intentions were hidden in plain sight: From the rape of the nation’s natural resources to his rise to power via the guiding hand of the oligarchs, to the maintenance of that power through cod elections and a sham media.

Then came bloody military interventions in Chechnya, Georgia, and Crimea, the brutal assassination of political opponents, the murder of journalists and the repression of homosexuals; destabilising the west through online misinformation campaigns,
interfering with elections and sponsoring the rise of Trump and Brexit.

Stop me when any of this
became a problem for our sporting overlords.

On the contrary, Russia’s influence seemed untouchable. Just over a year ago this column wrote about the
imprisonment on trumped-up charges of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny by Putin’s regime. Before his arrest, a spokesperson for Navalny called for western governments to impose sanctions on a list of Russian oligarchs which included Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich and key Everton sponsor Alisher Usmanov, accusing them of aiding and abetting the Putin regime. Many of the same names have cropped up on sanctions lists this week.

Navalny’s arrest had
coincided with the sacking of Frank Lampard, the latest example of Abramovich’s famed impatience with faltering managers. “While history suggests new Chelsea head coach Thomas Tuchel will
experience his boss’s ruthlessness sooner rather than later,” I wrote on the prospects of a man who had become part of the fabric of English football, “Abramovich might be more relaxed about his own long-term future.”

Just over a year on and Abramovich has put Chelsea up for sale, amid claims that he could face sanctions by the UK government. Abramovich, like Usmanov, has always denied any connections with Putin, but he appears to be moving pretty fast. Last week’s certainties have been turned upside down. That’s war for you. Meanwhile Frank Lampard is back in a job, with the Usmanov-connected Everton. Funny old game.

This week’s events have finally led to questions about funding and ownership in European football, but only to a point.

Saturday’s Match of the Day featured moving scenes of support for Ukraine at Goodison Park, including the tearful embrace between Ukrainian players Vitaliy Mykolenko of Everton and Manchester City’s Oleksandr Zinchenko.

Deploying sombre tones, the MOTD panel discussed the situation, including Abramovich’s decision to put “the stewardship and care” of Chelsea into the hands of the club’s charitable foundation, whatever that meant.

“I’d also like to hear his views on Putin’s invasion as well,” Gary Lineker concluded, wryly. Within minutes they had moved on to Newcastle’s win over Brentford, the latest step in the club’s resurgence under their new Saudi ownership.

Alas, the panel did not pick up the thread of the earlier discussion, even though the link seemed obvious. Football’s connections to brutal, repressive and strategically powerful regimes are under scrutiny, just not THAT much scrutiny.

You can’t blame MOTD for skipping swiftly on to discuss the merits of Joe Willock and Chris Wood. That’s what makes sport the perfect target for global gangsters intent on legitimising their savagery. At a certain point, there is always the imperative to get on with ‘talking about the football’: transfer targets, refereeing decisions or, for that matter, Kurt Zouma’s cats.

So, the owners of Newcastle United and Manchester City continue to blow the bejesus out of Yemen and torture and imprison dissidents and LGBTQ people, while distracting us with their big-money signings, their shiny golf tournaments, and their Grand Prix extravaganzas.

While it has taken the horror of Russia’s actions in Ukraine to even begin untangling its toxic influence on global sport, others adopting Putin’s playbook, move for move, carry on regardless.

The delusion that sport can take money from evildoers without finding itself tainted looks set to continue despite the recent revulsion towards Russia. Putin’s big con may have been revealed but the great sporting swindle continues. Addicted to the easy flow of blood money from ambitious despots, there is little evidence that we won’t get fooled again.