Samuel Inkoom, the former Ghanaian international, shared his experience of encountering racist abuse during his tenure in Ukraine. Joining the Ukrainian Premier League’s Dnipro in 2011, he disclosed instances of bananas being hurled at him in a match against Shakhtar Donetsk.
Despite these challenges, the 34-year-old said he remained indifferent and resilient against discrimination. In a recent interview with Starr FM of Accra, the defender said, “For me, any country I go to I psych myself that no, I’m not white and it’s not everything that I’ll get smoothly, so I don’t even pay too much attention towards that”.
“I remember one of our games in Ukraine playing against Shakhtar Donetsk, there was a whole lot, there was a banana, I didn’t even pay attention…They were throwing bananas and stuff on the pitch, they think blacks are monkeys but I didn’t even show any signal of what they were talking about. I don’t feel anything, I’m proud that I’m black,” he stated.
A key player in the Black Satellites, Samuel Inkoom was part of the historic African team winning the FIFA U20 World Cup in 2009. His career spanned clubs in Switzerland, France, Greece, the United States, Portugal, Turkey, Bulgaria, and Georgia, amassing 44 caps for Ghana in competitions like the Africa Cup of Nations and the World Cup.
Samuel Inkoom shares his experience of racist abuse in Ukraine
