After the German U17 national team won the title, Joti Chatzialexiou, sporting director of the national teams, speaks out about racist hostility.

The German U17 European champions have been subjected to racist hostility on their way to winning the title in Hungary. Joti Chatzialexiou, sporting director of the national teams, said in an interview published on the DFB website on Wednesday. “Off the pitch – or rather on the internet – there were unfortunately also unpleasant accompanying circumstances. There was a strong accumulation of racist comments under individual postings on our social media channels. Our boys also saw these, and they were very concerned about it,” said the official.

The football juniors had won 5:4 in a penalty shoot-out against France last Friday and celebrated the second U17 European Championship title for Germany after the triumph in 2009. Chatzialexiou said that the team had decided together not to give any room to “distractions in the course of the tournament and had thus become even closer as a team”. He called the players “already great role models at their young age. I’m very proud of that and will always be there for them and have their backs.”

Chatzialexiou said that they will never tire of “standing up for our values” and that “we will continue to firmly oppose racism, discrimination, hatred and hatemongering at all levels. With our teams, we stand for diversity and peaceful coexistence. Anyone who does not understand this has no place in our entire football family. “