Fenerbahçe Want Their Points Back

By: Martha | December 11th, 2007

Red n White kit Or one of their supporters does, anyway. During the last Champions League matchday, Inter Milan handed Turkey’s Fenerbahçe a 3-0 away loss, a result that assured the Italian club first place in Group G, and left Fenerbahçe needing a win against CSKA Moscow tomorrow to assure themselves a place in the knockout stages (though if Inter beat PSV, the Turks will go through no matter what). Needless to say, those three points would have been awfully nice to have, and one Fenerbahçe supporter has a plan to get them back: He’s levied an appeal with UEFA, arguing that Inter’s kit was culturally offensive, and therefore his club should be awarded the three points from the watch.

This is Inter centenary year, you see, and they’re wearing a special kit this season to recognize that fact. The kit features a giant red cross on a white background, and is meant to recall both the symbol of the city Milan (not surprisingly, a red cross on a white background), as well as kits worn by one of the clubs that was eventually folded into FC Internazionale Milano when the club was founded. (Not, it’s nothing to do with England, and it’s not the Cross of St. George.) The symbolism, however, also coincidentally recalls the symbolism employed by the Knights Templar, who are not exactly held in high regard in Turkey due to their involvement in little religious wars known as the Crusades (maybe you’ve heard of them).

Inter were aware of the issue, and actually wore their home kits during the match at Fenerbahçe to avoid causing offense to supporters, but assumed wearing the red and white kits in their home ground wasn’t a problem. Oh, how wrong they were. The decision was latched onto by the Turkish press and apparent was a significant issue after the match in some circles. Though the Turkish club haven’t said a thing about it — officially anyway — that doesn’t apply to their supporters and one of them (who happens to be an “expert on European law”) has set out to rectify the situation by convincing UEFA to overturn the match. Erm, yeah. Good luck with that.