Translated by Ollie Richardson & Angelina Siard
12:57:48
09/07/2018
strana.ua
The story with Domagoj Vida and Ognjen Vukojević’s video that they recorded after the victory of Croatia over Russia in the quarter-finals of the 2018 World Cup continues. As a reminder, in this video message the Croats said “Glory to Ukraine” and devoted the victory over the Russian team to the fans of Dynamo Kiev. FIFA already warned Domagoj Vida about the inadmissibility of political slogans, but didn’t give the player a ban.
On his page on Facebook the president of the Football Federation of Ukraine Andrey Pavelko said that he completely supports Vida and Vukojević.
“The Football Federation of Ukraine and I personally have taken a hard line in the situation that developed around the football player of Croatian national team Domagoj Vida after the victory of the team in World Cup 2018 quarterfinal: the bright game and fighting qualities of Vida, as well as of all the Croatian national team, deserved the right to participate in the tournament’s semi-final!
The football player – who defended the honor of Dynamo Kiev for many years and lived in the capital of Ukraine during difficult times in our country – has many friends and fans there who deserved to have a piece of this victory devoted to them! Over the last few years the slogan ‘Glory to Ukraine!’ became a symbol of inflexibility and patriotism for our citizens! And it is quite natural that someone who our country has given a lot to treats both it and its citizens with great respect. He has the right to publicly express respect both for Ukraine and for its citizens! We quickly sent a letter to the appropriate authorities of FIFA and UEFA for the purpose of defending not only the football player of the Croatian national team, but also, first of all, someone who has the right to have their own position and respects our country!!! And Vida will play in World Cup 2018 semi-final! Glory to Croatia! Glory to Ukraine!!!” wrote Pavelko.
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