FC Metz, which faces Monaco on Sunday for the 27th day of Ligue 1, has had unique warm-up jerseys made: they tell the family history of the professional footballers of the Lorraine squad. Objective: to raise awareness and raise awareness about racism.
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It is an original initiative, which aims to fight against racist temptations and xenophobic excesses. FC Metz players received special warm-up jerseys: artist Paolo Del Veccio designed tunics that tell the footballers’ family history. Explanations from Hélène Schrub, the general director of FC Metz.
Hélène Schrub: Each player tried to retrace his own life path, since there are players who themselves come from other countries, other continents. And then there are players who chose to go back a little further in their family history and re-interview their sister, their parents, their grandparents to really get a more precise idea of where they came from. And in fact, this approach was very collective, both collective and individual, since they came together around collective workshops. But everyone has had this approach. It allowed them to exchange ideas and ultimately get to know each other better.
franceinfo: The idea is to show that crossbreeding is an enrichment?
Exactly. In our squad, we have more than ten nationalities which are represented through our different players. And the objective was already to have them share their own experiences, but above all to be able to demonstrate that, indeed, cultural richness, the richness of origins ultimately makes for the richness of a team and a collective. And that in fact, regardless of where we come from, we all come from somewhere else, whether from another neighborhood, another city, another department or another continent. In fact, we all come from somewhere else. Finally, everyone ends up under the same jersey which is that of FC Metz.
This Sunday is the day dedicated to the fight against racism in stadiums. Do you think that in one way or another, this type of initiative brings ?
To think that the fight against discrimination has been won would be a mistake. This is why we must always, constantly repeat. What I think is that football is not a bubble that is outside of society. And in football too, there is racism. Should we each do it at our own level? It’s taking our part in this fight. And that’s how we can change mentalities on a daily basis.