The basketball match in departmental Division 2, Mende – Rodez III, played on Friday November 29, was punctuated by incidents. While the game was over (85-60) and there were less than fifteen seconds left to play, the cries of a Lozère player led to great tension on the field, leading the referee to distribute four disqualifying fouls. A first this season for the Aveyron-Lozère committee, which, no longer having its own disciplinary committee, transmitted the file to the Occitanie league.
But what exactly happened that evening, when the game had taken place normally until then, in the small gymnasium of the Chaptal high school, BC Mendois? In the images captured at this precise moment and which we obtained, we can hear a local player being the author of shouts in the middle of the game, while in defense.
“We can’t let this go.”
Renewing these same cries afterwards, adding his arms raised in a rounded manner “These are the cries of a gorilla. This is clearly racism. We cannot let this pass,” indicates Ruthenian President Xavier Alric. Faced with facts, his players were unable to hold back their anger, without however causing the collective altercation to turn into fistfights. However, there followed a moment of hesitation for which the man in black made four disqualifying faults, two on each side.
“Club War Cry”
Racist insults that the president of the player in question, Arno Jannarelly, refutes. “There was a misinterpretation of his cries,” he said. While the gap was made, our player wanted to reproduce the club’s war cry, like what is done before matches or before each restart by many teams: “BCM ahou, ahou, ahou”. These are not monkey cries, but barking. » The club logo also displays a wolf. Chambering like this can be practiced quite often for him. And he argues: “In the end, some Rodez players stayed after the match for 40 minutes anyway. » For a response from the Ruthenian side: “Yes, 40 minutes, but to establish the reports. »
“He then apologized to the players, and also to the referee,” continues the Lozère manager. But for him, what happened that evening was “just the result of an excess of zeal on the part of the referee, a bad interpretation and too strong a reaction from the Ruthenians, whose players on the bench returned to the field. To be continued.
