Legia fans’ controversial reaction to kneeling Leicester City players

Saturday, October 2, 2021 at 00:00• Yanick Vos • Last update: 21:53

“Kneel to His Majesty”, a large banner unfolded on Thursday evening as the hard core of Legia Warsaw unfolded ahead of the Europa League game against Leicester City. The Polish fans were aware that the players of the Foxes before kick-off would kneel in front of Black Lives Matter and responded to it in their own way. It is not the first time that the supporters of Legia Warsaw have been in the news with a high-profile banner.

That it is precisely the supporters of Legia Warsaw that come up with this banner is no surprise. The hard core of the Polish top club has a reputation in this area. The loyal supporters are nicknamed Zyleta, in other words The Razor. The Legia fans are famous for atmosphere actions, which are often on the edge and sometimes over it. In addition, the supporters group is also regularly guilty of racism and violence. Zyleta’s disagreement with footballers kneeling in support of the Black Lives Matter movement is evident from the banner presented Thursday night alone. Entirely according to the plan of the Legia fans, the Leicester players – and with André Martins and Filip Mladenovic also two Legia players – knelt in front of the huge banner.

It is not entirely clear who was depicted on the banner. Various Polish media write that it is simply a face, intended to symbolize the supporters of the club. Other Polish media report that it concerns God of War Kratos, a Spartan warrior from Greek mythology, while it could also be the Polish former boxer Andrzej Golota. The 53-year-old former top athlete was also present in the Wojska Polskiego Stadium on Thursday evening. In the corridors is also the name of one Adam Fahita, a great example within the supporters club.

UEFA manages to find Legia Warsaw
Ajax is the last Dutch club to compete against Legia Warsaw. In the 2014/15 season, the team from Amsterdam won 0-3 in the Europa League. The Dutch top club was not bothered by the fanatical home crowd at the time. The stadium had to remain empty for two games because of a penalty by UEFA as a result of racist chants in the match against Lokeren in November 2014. In addition, the association handed out a fine of 105,000 euros and the club was not allowed to take supporters to away games for the entire season. . It was not the first penalty imposed on the Polish club by the European Football Association and it certainly would not be the last.

The supporters of Legia Warsaw have maintained a warm relationship with those of ADO Den Haag for years

When Legia Warsaw qualified for the Champions League for the first time in 22 years in 2016, the fans wanted to know that too. A gigantic banner was displayed before the group match against Borussia Dortmund and went around the world. ‘Guess who’s back’, the banner read. There was nothing wrong with the banner, but the behavior of the fans was. Legia lost the match 0-6 and the supporters were unable to control themselves. The hard core ran off with pepper spray from the stewards and the branch with German Dortmund supporters was stormed. UEFA knew enough and handed out a penalty: a match without an audience against Real Madrid.

Relations between Legia Warsaw and UEFA have been tense for years. The Polish supporters do not fail to lash out at the European Football Association through atmospheric actions. In the summer of 2014, a banner displayed by the supporters prompted UEFA to fine the club €80,000. In the preliminary round of the Europa League, Legia played against FK Aktobe and prior to that game, a large banner appeared on which a pig was depicted, with the text: ‘Football may mean nothing to you, but money probably does’. The fans had hung the banner over a UEFA logo. With this banner, the fans protested against the exclusion of Legia Warsaw from the Champions League. At the time, the reason for the exclusion lay with the trainer of Legia, who brought in a suspended player hard in the play-offs of the billion-dollar ball with Bartosz Bereszynski. The Polish top club’s won match was turned into a defeat and exclusion from the Champions League was a fact. Despite the fact that Celtic had lost 6-1 in two matches, the Scottish club entered the play-offs. Legia Warsaw had to settle for the Europa League.

In early August 2017, Legia Warsaw played in the preliminary round of the Champions League against Astana from Kazakhstan. Before the match, a huge banner appeared showing a German army commander holding a gun to a child’s head. The following text was shown: ‘During the uprising in Warsaw, Germans killed 160,000 people, many of them children’. The supporters wanted to reflect on the Warsaw Uprising, which started on August 1, 1944. The official Twitter account of Legia Warsaw shared the photo, which caused a lot of commotion on social media. UEFA was not pleased with the banner and handed out a fine of 35,000 euros. The union packaged the fine under the heading: blocking the stairs.

The punishment was against the sore leg of the Legia supporters, who quickly reacted. FC Sheriff visited the play-offs of the Europa League in mid-August. Afterwards, nobody talked about the 1-1 draw, but the very debatable banner was the subject of discussion. The hard core showed a huge banner showing a pig, with the UEFA logo in the background. The pig was wearing a suit with euro symbols on it, with the text: ‘And the fine of 35,000 euros goes to…’ In the end UEFA got the better of it, because the fine for the banner was not 35,000 euros, but no less than 50,000 euros.

The hatred from Legia’s tifosi to UEFA is great and has not diminished over the years. That proved once again last summer, when the Polish club took on Slavia Prague at home in the play-offs of the Europa League. The UEFA logo was displayed on the long side of the grandstand with a rubber duck next to it. Anyone with even a little command of the English language will understand the message. UEFA was ruthless, handing out a fine of 15,000 euros for a ‘provocative message of an offensive nature’.

On Thursday evening, the supporters of Legia Warsaw again made their mark. This time, UEFA was not made fun of, but a much-discussed banner made it clear how Polish fans feel about kneeling before a match. Whether this action will also lead to a penalty from UEFA remains to be seen. For now, Warsaw is reminiscing about the 1-0 victory over Leicester. Immediately afterwards, shirts were even printed in honor of the victory over the Premier League club. Perhaps Legia would do well to keep the proceeds of the sale of these shirts separately. UEFA will certainly make a statement. If not now, then in a while.