UEFA will not investigate alleged racist remark made to Hwang Hee-chan by Como player during Wolves friendly
UEFA has said it's unable to investigate alleged racist abuse aimed at Woles star Hwang Hee-chan during a pre-season friendly with Como 1907.
Hwang reported the incident during the second half, sparking a furious reaction from his Wolves teammates including Daniel Podence, who was sent off for punching a player.
Wolves were facing Italian side Como and held a 1-0 lead midway through the second half when players from both teams came together in unsavoury scenes.
Podence then attempted to punch the Como player after Hwang accused an opposing player of racist abuse.
After a lengthy stoppage, play resumed, with Wolves boss Gary O'Neil saying that the decision to continue the match was made by the South Korean star.
Speaking to Wolves' website, Gary O’Neil said: “Channy heard a racist remark which is really disappointing. I spoke to Channy about it, checked whether he wanted to take the team off or come off himself, but he was keen the team carried on and got the work they needed.
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"It’s really disappointing that it happened, that we have to talk about it and that it impacted the game – not ideal and things like that shouldn’t be around.
“He’s really disappointed, of course, and understandably. I’m proud of the fact that he wanted to carry on and put his team first in a difficult moment for him.
"He knew it was a pre-season trip and he wanted the lads to work and get their minutes, even though he’d suffered something hugely offensive. Channy will be OK, he’ll get our full support and we’ll pick him up in the morning and make sure he’s OK.
“It’s a together group. Of course, there’s ways to handle that and we don’t want to leave ourselves short on the pitch, but it’s a together group.
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"We’ve worked really hard this week, had a good week, had some great moments in the game, but it’s an unfortunate incident we have to deal with and have to discuss when, ideally, we’d be talking about the game. Of course, when an incident like that happens in a game, it’s the first thing we discuss.”
Wolves later outlined their intentions to submit a complaint to UEFA, however, European football's governing body says they're unable to investigate as it was not a UEFA competition match.
A UEFA spokesperson said: “The fight to eliminate racism, discrimination and intolerance from football is a major priority for our organisation.
“Discriminatory behaviour is not tolerated in UEFA’s competitions. Any such behaviour would fall under Article 14 of the UEFA disciplinary regulations.
“While UEFA will continue its fight to eliminate all forms of discrimination in football, the organisation’s disciplinary bodies can only take action for incidents that take place in UEFA competitions.”
In a statement released on Tuesday, Como played down the incident as a misunderstanding.
Mirwan Suwarso, official representative of Como’s ownership club, said: “Our club does not tolerate racism and condemns all forms of it in the strongest possible way.
“We spoke to the defender in question to understand what was said. He has told us the comment he made, to his co-defender, was ‘ignore him, he thinks he’s Jackie Chan’.
“Having spoken to our player at length, we are confident this was in reference to the player’s name, and to the constant references of ‘Channy’ made by his own team-mates on the pitch.
“As far as our club is concerned our player did not say anything in a derogatory manner.
“We are disappointed that the reaction of certain Wolves players has seen the incident blown out of proportion.”
It's not the first time that the forward has suffered racial abuse in his career, with a similar incident happening in the summer of 2022 in a friendly with Portuguese side Farense.
Hwang joined Wolves in the summer of 2021 and has gone on to make 94 appearances for the club, scoring 22 goals.
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Italian club Como won promotion to Serie A last season and have some familiar names backing them, including Thierry Henry and Cesc Fabregas, who is a coach and shareholder.
The game, which was played in Marbella, was Wolves’ first pre-season friendly ahead of the new Premier League season and they went on to win 1-0.