Report on “The Last Penalty of Yugoslavia” Public Debate

The first event organized by the International Centre for Sports Studies (CIES) on 6th April 2017 in collaboration with the Museum of Art and History of Neuchâtel and within the series of events called ‘Printemps Culturel 2017: « Carrefour Sarajevo »’ was highly successful. Nearly fifty members of the public attended the evening debate, which was held at Espace Gilbert Facchinetti in Neuchâtel. The gathered audience had all come to hear an academic discussion between the author Gigi Riva and Professor Pierre Lanfranchi.

The official opening of the symposium was made by Mr. Thomas Facchinetti, who is the city councillor responsible for Sports, Culture, Integration and Tourism in the City of Neuchâtel. He welcomed the enthusiastic crowd who had gathered to learn more about the evening’s theme of geopolitics linked to sport.

The event began with an introduction by Pierre Lanfranchi, who is Professor of History at De Montfort University in Leicester (England) and also an academic collaborator at the CIES.

Professor Lanfranchi next warmly welcomed onto the stage the specially invited guest for the evening, Mr Gigi Riva. Mr Riva was a war correspondent during the Balkans war in the 1990s and is the author of "J'accuse l'ONU", published by Calmann-Lévy in 1995. In 2016 he would publish the internationally successful, “The last penalty of Yugoslavia”, which would form the main subject of discussion during this special debate.

As the fascinating discussion developed, Gigi Riva passed on his deep knowledge and experiences to an attentive and engaged public who were interested in understanding more of the historical and geopolitical significance of the famous final penalty taken by Yugoslavia’s Faruk Hadzibegic during the 1990 World Cup quarter-final held in Florence, Italy. Mr Riva was able to go into great detail about the symbolism of this final kick and how the resulting defeat against Maradona’s Argentina precipitated the break-up of the former Yugoslavia.

It was a fascinating evening for all those who attended and which was full of new insights and discoveries.

We hope that guests will now be able to join us for the second event organized by CIES in collaboration with the Museum of Art and History of Neuchâtel on 27 April 2017. This second event will also be within the series called ‘Printemps Culturel 2017: « Carrefour Sarajevo »’ and is titled: "Players of Balkan origin in Swiss football: A successful integration?" Again, the evening will be in the form of a round table discussion.

Confirmed speakers for this second event include Gérard Castella, who is coach of the Swiss U19 national football team and a former coach of Neuchâtel Xamax FC, Bashkim Iseni who is director of Albinfo.ch and a specialist in Balkan diasporas, Edmond Isoz who is a former director of the Swiss Football League and former European Professional Football Leagues board member, as well as Dr Raffaele Poli, who is Head of the CIES Football Observatory.

 

 

"Players of Balkan origin in Swiss football: A successful integration?" Please click here for more Event Details

Date: 27th April 2017 at 6:30pm

Venue: History and Art Museum of Neuchâtel, Esplanade Léopold-Robert 1, 2000 Neuchâtel.

This event is free to attend.

For more information, please contact: events(at)cies.ch or telephone + 41 (0) 32 718 39 00

 

We very much look forward to welcoming you to this second special event.