England fans 'racist' - Mauger
04 November 2006
Monday morning's test against England last night took on an explosive edge after Aaron Mauger claimed several All Blacks were racially abused by sections of the Twickenham crowd during last year's grand slam tour victory.
Mauger revealed racial abuse from a section of the Twickenham crowd was behind Anton Oliver's recent outburst about English fans.
And the burning fuse for a fiery encounter was shortened when England captain Martin Corry used British newspapers to urge the anticipated record crowd of 82,000 fans to make Oliver pay for his controversial remarks.
After a reasonably sedate buildup earlier in the week, the comments from Mauger and Corry will ensure the remaining hours between now and the eagerly-awaited clash in London will be as prickly as possible.
Replying to a question from an English journalist on Oliver's comments that English fans "are ignorant and arrogant", Mauger, who is part-Samoan, revealed his teammate was upset about crowd behaviour in New Zealand's 23-19 win at Twickenham this time last year.
Mauger played in the match but Oliver was not selected and watched from the stands. He did not reveal the alleged racial remarks in his original criticism of English fans on a New Zealand website last week.
The remarks were seized upon by British newspapers, and now Corry is using Oliver's criticism to urge the Twickenham crowd to cheer England on to a famous upset victory.
Mauger's revelation will only add to the tension particularly if Corry's rah-rah incites English fans to target All Blacks players.
"In terms of the crowd I think there were a few racial remarks made to a few of our boys last year, and a few of the guys took exception to it which is fair enough because there's no place for that in sport," Mauger said.
"It seemed to be the Island guys who got picked on."
Oliver also attacked the English press and Mauger confirmed the players were upset by the British media's reaction to the controversial Kapo O Pango haka.
"With the haka as well, pulling out a new haka, I don't know if that was received too well. (The papers) might have been quoted as being 'animals' or something like that, so it was a bit disheartening."
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Oliver had hinted at abuse in his original comments, saying: "I gave some friends some tickets (to last year's test) and they were just shocked at the level of opprobrium aimed at our players."
Corry's remarks will only intensify the All Blacks' concerns about crowd security. Corry admitted Oliver's remarks had given his side extra motivation to end their five-test sequence without a victory, also brushing aside suggestions that his reshuffled side was certain to lose.
"It's not the England crowd that I know," said Corry in response to Oliver's condemnation.
"I hope there'll be 82,000 people there desperate to prove him wrong."
British papers also made plenty of comments attributed to recalled All Blacks hardman Keith Robinson.
"They (England) are bullies; that's their game beating guys up up front," Robinson was reported as saying. " If you take on a bully you are going to be in for one. We are playing well and we have to beat up the bully, I suppose."
It is obvious that last year's events, as revealed by Mauger, are still a sore point with the All Blacks.
Mauger said the English reaction to Oliver's comments had been discussed on the team bus and pointed out his teammate's criticism was directed at fans not the England team. "I don't think he meant to fuel the fire over the English or anything," Mauger said. "I think it was more directed towards the crowd and not towards the players at all because we have the utmost respect for the English side."
Mauger's revelations are likely to also hit a nerve in England, where racial abuse by football fans has been a problem since the first black players came to prominence in the 1970s and 1980s.
Ever since Eric Cantona's infamous "flying kung fu kick" incident in 1994, when the Manchester United football star leapt the spectator hoardings to attack an abusive fan, taunting of players by crowd members has been a hot issue.
Mauger was reluctant to elaborate on his comments, saying: "I don't want to talk about it too much because I'll probably get into trouble."
However, he did say the All Blacks had not encountered racial abuse from any other group of fans anywhere else in the world.
It is also embarrassing for England's national union, the RFU, which only six weeks ago censured former All Blacks halfback Mark Robinson after four spectators claimed he had racially abused a rival player in an English club game.
The RFU didn't uphold the charge, clearing Robinson of racism, but censured him for the use of "inappropriate language" on the field.
It is not yet known whether New Zealand team management has asked either the RFU or Twickenham officials to increase security on the perimeter of the field to prevent problems during Monday morning's clash.
A recent factsheet about racism in football, produced by the University of Leicester, said "racism within professional football in Britain has, historically, been tied to the nature of British society, in particular its colonialist and racist past . . . racism is constitutive of what has become a 'British way of life'."
Oliver attacked England's "colonialist" attitudes in his original comments.
One of the more infamous incidents in England came two years ago, when three fans were banned from football matches for five years after abusing Birmingham City striker Dwight Yorke.
Two of the men were fined $NZ1400 each, and the third $NZ500.
Yorke faced the abuse while warming up as a substitute, triggering a police investigation which led to five arrests. Birmingham manager Steve Bruce said that Yorke had been the target of "monkey" chants.
Just over a week ago in England, football's anti-racism organisation, Kick It Out, ended a week of action against racism, while Cricket Australia recently announced a zero tolerance policy on racial abuse, threatening life bans for offenders
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