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English football show solidarity with Ukraine as fans hold flags, applaud and sing chants

English football show solidarity with Ukraine as fans hold flags, applaud on a specific minute and sing chants aimed at Vladimir Putin.

Premier League, EFL and non league players, managers and spectators were given the green light to protest against the Russian invasion by displaying Ukraine flags at their games this weekend in a show of respect and support for the besieged nation.

The FA won’t consider the presence of flags on the pitch or in the stands as a breach of their rules. The governing body usually prohibit anything construed as a political message.

It comes as the Premier League’s Ukrainian players voiced their anger on social media, including Man City’s Oleksandr Zinchenko, Everton’s Vitalii Mykolenko and West Ham’s Andriy Yarmolenko.

Wembley has joined sport’s growing support for Ukraine by lighting their famous Arch in the colours of blue and yellow ahead of Sunday’s Carabao Cup final.

A number of clubs showed their support by changing their profile picture, turning the club crest to yellow and blue along with a hashtag,some posted a simple message ‘we stand alongside you’ prior to their game, while others welcomed request from fans to hold up pictures of the Ukraine flag as you can see throughout the article.

Cambridge United wrote: “Solidarity with Ukraine and all Ukranian people. 🙏 Thoughts also with our Ukranian friends in Cambridge, across the UK and all over the world. 🇺🇦 #StandWithUkraine”

Colchester United tweeted: “💙 United With Ukraine. 🇺🇦 #ColU”

Bradford City saw that their fans were planning to applaud and show the Ukrainian flag with the city having the biggest Ukrainian population in England after London.

Barnsley and Corinthian-Casuals changed their crest to yellow and blue while the EFL and Blackpool and a Ukraine flag outline around their circle profile picture.

Nottingham Forest, Shrewsbury Town and many other fans of other clubs planned to do something in the stands.

Tadcaster Albion’s juniors reverted to using their club’s colours blue and yellow corner flags for the remainder of the season in solidarity of the Ukrainian children.

Leeds United had ‘Ukraine’ written on their advertising boards along with yellow and blue hearts throughout the game, while fans inside the ground helps up Ukraine shirts.

See photos and videos from throughout the day below…

English football show solidarity with Ukraine as fans hold flags, applaud and sing chants


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What else is happening in sport?

– Manchester City’s Ukraine defender Oleksandr Zinchenko joined a vigil in Manchester city centre to show support for his country and may face Everton at the weekend, while West Ham’s Ukraine winger Andriy Yarmolenko has been given some time off by the club

– Manchester United have terminated their sponsorship deal with Russia’s national airline Aeroflot

– Uefa is looking to end its major £30m-a-year sponsorship deal with Russian state-run gas giant Gazprom

– Former heavyweight boxing champion and Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said he was prepared to fight in a “bloody war” alongside his brother Wladimir Klitschko

– Russian tennis star Daniil Medvedev, soon to be the world’s leading men’s player, said hearing the news of his nation’s invasion was “not easy” and wants to “promote peace all over the world”

– Andrey Rublev, Russia’s second-highest ranked tennis player, made a plea for peace after beating Hubert Hurkacz to reach the final of the Dubai Tennis Championships, signing a TV camera lens on court with the words “no war please”

– Banners stating ‘No a la guerra’ – which translates to ‘No to war’ – will be displayed at all matches in the top two divisions of Spanish football this weekend

– Formula 1 team Haas have removed their Russian-based sponsor – a company owned by Dmitry Mazepin, a close associate of Vladimir Putin – from their equipment during the final day of pre-season testing in Barcelona. Mazepin’s son, Nikita, is one of Haas’ drivers

– Ukrainian tennis player Elina Svitolina has pleaded for help to “stop the war”

– The International Basketball Federation (FIBA) has postponed
World Cup 2023 qualifiers involving Netherlands v Russia on the 27th of February and Great Britain v Belarus that was scheduled a day later

When Russian tanks came into Ukraine’s border on Thursday, it brought back painful memories for Shota Arveladze.

For the Hull City manager’s home nation, Georgia, was also attacked by Vladimir Putin’s troops in 2008 and they still occupy parts of it today.

As Putin sent in his military this week, it had striking similarities to the Georgia incursion, back then, the Russian dictator claimed to also be helping two other self-proclaimed but not widely recognised republics, South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

Arveladze is much loved back in his homeland and was voted Georgia’s greatest player — winning 61 caps and scoring 26 goals as well as starting six matches for the country alongside his twin, Archil, and older brother Revaz.

He told SunSport: “Even today, it’s so tense in Georgia and I must give my best wishes to all my Ukrainian friends. It’s a country we love.

“Now it’s down to Russia to stop fighting, dropping bombs and waging a war that brings death and destroys families with parents crying from losing their children.

“There have been a lot of conflicts in Georgia since it became an independent nation again in 1991, and now it’s happening in Ukraine.

“Unfortunately, our nations and others around the Soviet bloc still struggle and sadly no one can do much about it.

“It’s been so painful and hard to see all of this. We should not have a war in any part of the world.”

There are concerns that Putin’s long-term aim is to restore a Soviet Union-style empire but Arveladze is against returning to those days under communist Moscow rule.

Arveladze grew up in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi when the country was part of the former Soviet Union, living with his parents, Justin and Tamara, who were both doctors, and his brothers.

He said: “Why do we have to go back to something that wasn’t as good as we have today?

“This is a sensitive subject for me because I’m proud of my nation, which has such a long history.

“When the Soviet Union collapsed in the early 1990s, our independence gave us our own identity.

“We read so many books about the first and second centuries in Georgia and Christianity being adopted in the early fourth century.

“We’ve got churches from the third, fourth and fifth centuries.

“Also, Georgian is one of the world’s oldest languages. It has its own alphabet and is completely unique.

“We have had so many famous painters, musicians and even Olympic champions from such a small nation.

“Also, Georgia was one of the first countries that ever made wine, 8,000 years ago.

“We have 55 different types — while the French only have nine! We even do great cheese and bread, too.”

He said: “As kids, you had happy times — you visit the mountains, the seaside and everything looks perfect.

“But then you wake up aged 15, 16 and you know it’s not as smooth as it looked when you were a kid.”

“My parents came home with a ball one day — and who would have thought it would lead us to becoming professional footballers?

“We used to play at home and broke windows and glass.

“But then we got smart enough to move glasses and other things around to stop them getting damaged — but not smart enough to put it all back.

“So our mum would come home and ask, ‘Why is this glass here and not where it was? What have you been doing? Playing football?’

“We were the children of doctors so it wasn’t expected for us to go down a football path.

“I’m very grateful our parents gave us as much freedom as they could back in a country at that time where it was difficult.

“They gave us a good education, a good school and didn’t stop us pursuing something we loved, rather than pushing us to be lawyers, doctors or whatever.”

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