Thirty-One Nil

by James Montague

  The Kosovo War failed to achieve full independence from Yugoslavia. It remains unrecognised by the United Nations as Russia, a staunch ally of Serbia, has a veto on the Security Council. Within UEFA thirty-seven of its fifty-three members recognise Kosovo, but it is not enough. UEFA changed its statutes so that, to become a member, you have first to be a member of the United Nations. Now the Kosovo team has been stuck in limbo, partially recognised but not enough. As a result the territory has been haemorrhaging players to other leagues and to other national teams. There has been some movement, though. A few months ago Sepp Blatter announced that Kosovo will be allowed to play friendly internationals against other FIFA members, a move which has caused a huge row in Serbia. Serbia has always maintained that Kosovo is, historically, an inviolable part of its territory, essentially colonised by the Kosovars. An enclave of Serbs, making up 5 per cent of its population, still live in Kosovo. Later this month FIFA’s executive committee in Zurich will sit down and discuss the practicalities of Kosovo playing friendly matches against other members. So Fadil and Eroll are here with a petition they have drawn up, demanding that Kosovo be allowed to play. When Switzerland and Albania were drawn in the same group for 2014 World Cup qualification, the two men hatched a plan. They would pull all the strings they could to get the big-name Kosovar players on both sides to sign it and present it to FIFA. Unsurprisingly, this has become a hugely sensitive topic, so much so that Blatter postponed a decision on Kosovo’s friendlies for six months. Parliamentary elections were taking place in Serbia and there was a fear that increasing Kosovo’s visibility might inflame an already fervently nationalistic atmosphere.

  The issue of Switzerland’s Kosovar players has become hugely controversial here, too. Many of the players have been raised in Switzerland from birth, have been given a quality of life they would have been unlikely to experience in Kosovo and brought up through Switzerland’s first-class training academies. Switzerland has given these talented players every opportunity to make the most of their gifts. The fear is that they may turn their backs on it. That morning SonntagsBlick published a front-page story on the issue with the headline ‘The Fear of Kosovo’. Next to it was a photograph of Xherdan Shaqiri, one of Europe’s most talented young players and the one the Swiss fear losing above all others. But the subtext was clear. The players’ allegiances were also being questioned.

  Fadil understood the idea of divided loyalties. He was part of Kosovo’s best football side, FC Prishtina, from the capital. Back in the mid-1980s Kosovo wasn’t one of the six socialist republics that officially made up Yugoslavia, but it was an autonomous province. In 1974 Tito had given Kosovo virtually the same rights as the Bosnians, Croats, Serbs, Slovenians, Macedonians and Montenegrans. Eroll played for FC Prishtina, too, a little later, but Fadil was the undisputed star. As we talk, nervous middle-aged men in suits approach every few minutes, bowing and scraping in the hope of getting an autograph. Even the twenty-one-year-old waiter asks for Fadil’s autograph, midway through serving him. At first FC Prishtina was just another team from another part of Yugoslavia, whose identity had been moulded by its host region, such as Dinamo Zagreb from Croatia, Red Star Belgrade from Serbia, Željezničar Sarajevo from Bosnia. Between 1983 and 1988, FC Prishtina survived in the top division of Yugoslav football. They even beat the mighty Red Star Belgrade in Belgrade in their first season.

  ‘Then it began, repression against all Yugoslavs by the Serbs,’ says Fadil of life after 1989, when Slobodan Milošević became president of Serbia and rolled back all of the autonomous gains that Kosovo had made under Tito. ‘But football was a beautiful story. Everybody in Kosovo was behind the club and it was a symbol of resistance. It was the only sphere in life where Albanians could express their love for football and other things.’

  The team also featured the father of the current Albanian captain, Lorik Cana. The club made them the most famous men in Kosovo. ‘FC Prishtina was not only a football club; it means something more. Resistance,’ Fadil explains. ‘It was a great time, a great generation. We were really a symbol of all the things they could not express in other ways.’ The authorities were always on the lookout for any signs of overt Kosovar nationalism that spilt over the boundaries of what was acceptable. ‘The most significant [sign of this] was against Red Star Belgrade,’ recalls Eroll. Red Star was seen as a bastion of Yugoslav and, later, of Serbian nationalism. ‘There was one game where sixty people were jailed because they were singing.’ Eroll clears his throat and sings. ‘Eh, Oh. Eh, Oh.’ He is singing to the tune of ‘Day-O’ (The Banana Boat Song). It didn’t sound like something that would land sixty people in jail. ‘They said it was similar to Enver Hoxha [pronounced Hodger]’, the former Albanian dictator, Eroll replies.

  Fadil’s performances got him noticed by the bigger sides in the Yugoslav league and he signed for Partizan Belgrade. But unlike at Red Star (a team that would later become such an overt channel of Serb nationalism that many of its ultras would end up fighting for Arkan’s Tigers, one of the most feared and brutal of all Serbian paramilitary groups during the civil war), Partizan had a history of tolerance and of signing players regardless of their ethnicity. ‘I was very well accepted,’ Fadil recalls of his time there. He was voted players’ player of the year in 1987 and made most of his thirteen appearances for Yugoslavia while at the club. ‘Partizan had a tradition of playing all nationalities,’ he says. ‘Even now I am very accepted by all Partizan fans. Partizan played a lot of Albanian players. They recruited the player because of the talent not because of the political reasons.’ It was because of this that he saw playing for the national team as a moment of pride rather than betrayal. By playing for Yugoslavia he was representing Kosovo on the world stage. ‘I was proud to represent Kosovo and play for Yugoslavia,’ he says. But he believes that the Yugoslav system was still prejudiced. ‘I am sure that if I was not Albanian, with my quality, I would have played a lot, a lot of games,’ he says a little regretfully. ‘I played just thirteen times. As a player I never thought about it. As a sportsman you don’t want to think that could happen. But it is related.’

  By the time the Kosovo War broke out Fadil was a French citizen, starring for Nîmes in the French league. ‘It was the most difficult time in my life,’ he recalls. ‘My entire family, my brothers, sisters, were all there. And we couldn’t help anything. It was the worst time I’ve ever had.’ Eroll, though, saw how it all played out. Kosovo remained welded to the shrinking rump of a Serbian-dominated Yugoslavia. ‘Until Slobodan Milošević we were equal,’ says Eroll. ‘In 1991 we quit the league and formed our own.’ This wasn’t as easy as it sounds. ‘Five per cent of Kosovo are Serbs, and took over all the stadiums. Milošević suspended everything. You must understand what the destruction was like.’ Yet, according to Eroll, the illegal Kosovo league continued. Under threat of beatings and arrest the teams would meet every week to play. ‘We play on our improvised fields and then washed in rivers afterwards,’ Eroll recalls. ‘We just survived,’ he says of those bleak years between 1991 and 1999. ‘After games the police would beat, arrest, put pressure. We were put in jail. They would always ask us: “Why are you playing in illegal games?” It was difficult times.’

  Then came the American and British bombing of Belgrade. The Kosovo War left an imperfect peace behind; a state of limbo between recognition and full independence. Kosovo now enjoyed a degree of autonomy, that was true. The UN, which had held the reins in Kosovo since the conflict, had, only a few days before, handed over control of all governmental affairs to the Kosovars. A statue of Bill Clinton stands in Pristina. Both he and Tony Blair, Eroll says, remain hugely popular, regarded as saviours of the nation. ‘We have had one problem,’ Fadil deadpans. ‘The United States is not strong enough in football! It is not strong like in politics.’

  Now a twelve-team Super League exists in Kosovo, with clubs that have Serbian, Bosnian and Roma identities as well as Kosovar. But being outside UEFA means there is little money to develop the league
, the clubs or the players. The stadiums, Eroll explains, have not been updated in four decades and are crumbling. Kosovar players are easily, and cheaply, taken, too. ‘Presidents from Albanian clubs come here to take our players,’ says Eroll. ‘They say: “How can you produce so many players? We can’t do this.”’

  When Fadil was elected as president of the FFK in 2008, his mandate was clear. ‘The first task was international recognition,’ he says. ‘Admittance to UEFA and FIFA. This is the first goal. And then work with the youth because twenty years of isolation is a unique case in the heart of Europe.’ Kosovo’s quest for membership became even harder after a battle that was not of their making. Since 1997 Gibraltar has been trying to join UEFA, much to the displeasure of the Spanish who still view the territory as theirs. Gibraltar is the last colony in Europe. When Gibraltar overcame every hurdle to join UEFA, the Spanish federation threatened to pull all of its teams from international competition. They feared that a successful bid by Gibraltar would give Spain’s restive regions, namely Catalonia and the Basque Country, ideas about having their own national teams. UEFA changed its statutes. While FIFA requires that an association only be ‘internationally recognised’, a term that is open to interpretation, UEFA now states that an association’s country must be recognised by the United Nations. It didn’t stop Gibraltar. They successfully appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, arguing that they had made their original application before the rule change. In May 2013, UEFA had no choice but to accept Gibraltar as its fifty-fourth member. But the UN requirement remains, and Kosovo can do little about it even if Sepp Blatter had announced that Kosovo should be allowed to play international friendlies against FIFA members. UEFA president Michel Platini was vehemently against the move. ‘Blatter knows the situation very well and knows it is an injustice,’ Fadil says. ‘He has goodwill and is very positive. He says: “sports for all”. But Platini?’ he adds mockingly. ‘I can’t understand him. He doesn’t want the risk, even though twenty-two out of the twenty-seven countries in the European Union recognise us.’ The talk now was of trying to win Platini over, to make him see what the lack of UEFA membership was doing to young footballers in Kosovo, how it was pushing players away from what should be their natural homes into other national teams, into Switzerland, Albania, Finland and Belgium. ‘Who is stopping us? The big issue is the five EU states that did not recognise Kosovo. That is a huge problem,’ says Fadil. ‘We are talking [about] Spain, Cyprus, Greece, Slovakia and Romania.’ Eroll, in particular, is incredulous. ‘We are recognised by half of the world,’ he says, getting a little angrier now. ‘After a request to Serbia and Russia we are recognised by the International Criminal Court. Recognised by most of the states from Europe, from all the continents.’

  It is this perceived injustice that has brought the two men, dressed as smartly as they can muster, into the diner in Zurich. With the discussions on how and when and against whom Kosovo might be allowed to play friendly matches dragging on, they have come prepared to embark on a more direct campaign: guerrilla action to secure their interests. Eroll slides a piece of paper on to the table in front of me. The headline reads:

  DECLARATION FOR THE RIGHT

  TO KOSOVO

  TO PLAY INTERNATIONAL FOOTBALL.

  The petition sets out several points for those who sign it to agree with, namely that they support Kosovo’s right to play international football, that they applaud Blatter and FIFA’s declaration of support for Kosovo to play international friendlies and agree that Kosovo – recognised by ninety-one countries, the IMF, the World Bank and six other sports federations – is a unique case that needs a unique, one-off solution that would not, as the Spanish fear, set a precedent for other breakaway regions with designs on their own national team. The final two points, however, are the most illuminating.

  We confirm our loyalty to the national team of the countries for which we have the honour and privilege to play but we regret that our passion for football cannot be expressed for the national team of the country where our roots and ancestry come from.

  We finally commit our support to the Football Federation of Kosovo in this common fight for the implementation of the principles contained in the FIFA statutes: justice, respect, non-discrimination, refusal of political interference and universality of football.

  Fadil and Eroll will fill the blank spaces at the bottom of the paper with the names and signatures of some of Europe’s most talented players. Starting with the Swiss team. They are just waiting for the right moment to meet them all. Eroll’s phone rings. It is someone close to the Swiss camp, staying in a hotel a few miles drive from here. ‘We have to be ... sensitive with the Switzerland Football Association,’ Eroll says when he puts the phone down. ‘We do not want to be exposed.’ We are to leave straightaway and drive into the hills and wait for instructions. The meeting is on.

  **

  FIFA’s headquarters in Zurich can be found at the end of a tram line next to the city’s zoo. It is peaceful and quiet, in rolling green countryside. Approaching the main building, you follow steps down towards the entrance, one stone for each of FIFA’s 209 members, in alphabetical order, starting with Afghanistan and ending with Zimbabwe. One step is darker than the others. South Sudan has just been accepted as FIFA’s newest member and workmen have only just set a new stone into the walkway. The concrete is still wet. The building itself is an expensive, modern glass and stone construction; both light and dark. It is from here that world football is run. To many it is the United Nations of world sport, a Tower of Babel united by the common language of football, spreading the gospel of the game to all four corners of the earth.

  To others, though, FIFA’s headquarters is a modern-day Death Star, representative of nothing more than villainy, theft and corruption. Global soccer’s governing body has been beset by allegations of corruption and vice. It was here, two years previously, that FIFA’s powerful executive committee – FIFA’s decision-making body – gathered to vote on who should host the 2018 and 2022 World Cup finals. Even before the vote had taken place two of the executive committee’s members had been suspended after the Sunday Times caught both of them in an undercover sting agreeing to vote for a bid in return for cash. Russia and Qatar won the votes, but the vote, and the success of Qatar’s bid in particular, had opened the lid on a world of influence, power, money and conflicts of interest that had seriously damaged football’s standing in the world. But it was the president of FIFA who divided opinion the most. Sepp Blatter had spent most his time as president of FIFA operating largely under the radar of intense media scrutiny. There had been some scandals and allegations made but they had largely been ignored by the wider world.

  He was elected in 1998, on a globalist platform of encouraging the growth of football away from Europe. Blatter commanded a lot of support in Asia and Africa, where he oversaw the first World Cups on both continents and was a hugely popular figure in the Middle East. One of his first acts in power was to recognise the Palestinian national football team. He flew in to Gaza, to the Rafah airstrip, to be greeted as a hero. No one, not even the United Nations, had given parity to the Palestinians before. Their national team would be able to play in World Cup qualification matches and, as part of the Asian Football Confederation, access development funds. More importantly, there was now a mechanism through which the Palestinians could try and stop what they viewed as the manifestly unfair practice of border restrictions and arrests levelled at its players every time they tried to leave Gaza or the West Bank to play a match overseas. In the West, though, he was viewed with disdain, mocked as a hapless relic of a bygone age. That perception wasn’t helped when the FIFA presidential elections took place in 2011. His opponent, Qatar’s Mohamed Bin Hammam, looked to capitalise on Blatter’s unpopularity in the West to unseat him. Instead, Bin Hammam’s name was taken off the ballot after it was alleged that he offered cash for votes in the Caribbean. Blatter was re-elected unopposed and Bin Hammam was banned from football for life.
The whole saga may have been a masterclass in bureaucratic management but, to the outside world, it looked unseemly. The morning after Blatter’s election, the Sun newspaper ran a front page with a picture of Blatter next to that of Colonel Gaddafi. The headline ran: ‘Despot the Difference’.

  I am waiting for Blatter in a special room designed to receive representatives from all around the globe, from statesmen and presidents to royalty and dictators. It is a glass corner office with views out over Zurich’s green and pleasant landscape. Blatter is short, charismatic and friendly. He speaks in an expansive, rather loose English. It is one of five languages he speaks fluently. We talk a little about his native Switzerland, how the national team has one of its finest crop of players in years and how immigration has allowed the Swiss to tap into the global movements of people across boundaries. ‘We tried for a long time to maintain the so-called national team with nationals of the countries but in the last years there has been such a development in history,’ he says as we sit down. It is early in the morning, his first meeting of the day, so early he’s not wearing a tie. ‘It started with the collapse of the Soviet Union then at the same time also the collapse or disintegration of the Balkans. So all of a sudden FIFA has twenty or twenty-five more associations, all these satellite states … and this has produced a lot of migrations inside Europe.’