I was a fan of the XXXX and went to almost all the football matches. The fans back then were very violent after the games and during the match, we exchanged hate slogans. After a match, I lost my friends and I was confronted by a group of fans of the opposite team. […] I tried to get away but they surrounded me. They swore me and I tried to escape […] I ended up in hospital. My friends and fellow fans came to visit.
The event took place in 2005 at the Sofia University mini-football tournament for students. Our team consisted of students mainly from the Faculty XXXX, where I studied XXXX. In the group stage of the tournament, our team met a team composed mainly of students from the Faculty of YYYY. In the second half, the game became rough and there was a fight between the two teams. There were insults, threats and hate speech all the time. The hate speech continued after the game in the following months. In the end, the referee stopped the match and neither team received points.
It’s about an event related to the amateur football team XXXX, which existed until the 2015/2016 season in the XXXX Amateur Football Group. One of our players was a Syrian named XXXX, who has lived in Bulgaria for a long time and has his own business. He is passionate about football and with pleasure and on a voluntary basis joined the revival and existence of the team until the 2015/2016 season. In the second half of the season (in the spring), however, he was systematically insulted and very often fouled by opposing teams. In addition, at almost every game we played (especially as guests), he was insulted on ethnic and racial grounds by the public. The public in this level of Bulgarian football is mostly local people waiting for such sporting events to show contempt towards others, especially towards foreigners and minorities. We had to change our player several times in order to finish the match.
I was the chief referee of the final of the National Student Football Championship between the XXXX Sofia and the YYYY. In the regular time, the match ended 1: 1. After execution of penalty kicks, the team of YYYY won with a total score of 7:6. It is an interesting fact that the XXXX team was promised cash bonuses, which is not common in these tournaments. After the end of the match, the players of YYYY started to rejoice, but one player from XXXX ran about 20 m and hit an opponent from the other team. Several players from both teams joined the melee. My colleagues and I quickly intervened in the incident and tried to break up several bullies from one team, but then the situation became uncontrollable. There was a mass brawl between the two teams with many insults and “hate speech”. About 50 XXXX fans came down from the stands and there was a mass fight.
The event happened in February at the amateur mini-football tournament “XXXX” at the XXXX complex in Sofia. Our team “XXXX” played against the “YYYY”. The main striker in our team is XXXX, who is Nigerian but has been living in Bulgaria for several years. During the second half of the match, XXXX was fouled several times in a short time, which was not typical for our matches until then. In one of the last fouls, the goalkeeper of the opposing team left his field, got into a fight and started insulting him on racial grounds. The game was interrupted for several minutes. The goalkeeper was furious and difficult to tame by his and our team but eventually received a red card. We finished the match with a player more and won, but a bitter memory of the opposing player’s action remained.