Bosnia and Herzegovina will face Russia in St Petersburg on November 19 in a friendly game, the Bosnia Football Association confirmed.
Due to the conflict with Ukraine, Russia have been banned from almost every international competition including the World Cup.
The friendly game has made some concerns among the football fans and journalists and taking that into an account we spoke with TV N1 Sarajevo Sports Journalist Haris Mrkonja. The journalist has told VbetNews that it was a really big surprise to him.
“To me, it was a really big surprise because even though there was information coming out in the previous days that a friendly between Russia and Bosnia and Herzegovina might be arranged I thought that it was merely a political game because this year in October we have general elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina and because everything is tied to politics in my country I thought that it could be just some election game," Haris Mrkonja told VbetNews when asked to share his opinion on the friendly match.
"It was quite surprising to see that the opposite happened that the Football Federation of BIH actually accepted the invitation of the Russian Federation. In my personal opinion I don’t think matters in this case I will just say that the major part of journalists and fans of BIH don’t like the idea that the national team has to go and play a friendly match in Russia given the geopolitical situation.”
“I know for a fact because I contacted already a few of our national team players some of whom are very important for Bosnia and Herzegovina," Mrkonja said when asked whether some players will refuse to play.
"They already said that they will not play against Russia if they are called up for the game. So there is more than one and I am sure that many players do not feel it is correct and right to go to Russia and promote something that is clearly a political statement from Bosnia and from Russia. I can’t name any names because they wished to remain anonymous until this dies down a little bit. But yea there are players that will refuse to go to Russia. And we can expect in that case that only players from one part of the country will show up and go to Russia because as you know the political situation in my country is very complicated and we can expect that only part of the players that play for the national team will be present for that match.”
Since Russia is banned from participating in almost any international competition, the TV N1 Sarajevo journalist spoke of whether there will be any consequences from UEFA or FIFA.
“There will be absolutely zero consequences because our football federation contacted UEFA prior to accepting the invitation to play the friendly game against Russia," said Haris Mrkonja to VbetNews.
"And UEFA told them that they have no jurisdiction over friendly matches, that they cannot approve or disapprove playing any international friendly matches. We already have confirmation that there will be no investigation and there will be no punishment that there will be no ban for anyone but the thing I personally as a professional and someone who is a fan of BIH, I am very concerned about what message Bosnia and Herzegovina as a country Is sending when you accept to play a friendly match with a national team like Russia. It’s a match that doesn’t basically serve anyone any good. It’s a match that 99% of the people that I have talked to already say is wrong and that nothing can be gained from this match except that Russia can gain some PR in the world of football.”