The Italian world cup preparations suffered a major setback after Ac Milan and Italy star striker Mario Balotelli was racially abused during a training session by a group of men which are Italian outside Italy’s training headquarters in Coverciano, Florence on Wednesday.
The president of Italian Football Federation Giancarlo Abete condemned the incident which is not happening for the first time and described it as an “unacceptable behavior”. “This is unacceptable behaviour,” said Abete. “This should not happen – we will take this episode into account.”
The situation was brought under calm by the quick intervention of Local police in other to allow Italy’s training session to continue.
Balotelli who was previously abused racially by a section of Roma fans during a Serie A game was very calm as he looked away from the incident.
The IFF president Abete, speaking further, insisted: “The important thing is that this is only a minority and they have no regard for civil coexistence.”
Team-mate Ciro Immobile also added his voice by saying “In 2014 we shouldn’t have to deal with racism. We have to improve as a nation.”Fortunately, Mario was very calm. We know how serious this is but we don’t want to further discuss this within the group.”