France, Algeria and sport: From colonisation to globalisation

The governance of professional soccer: Five case studies – Algeria, China, England, France and Japan

“…Amara (Amara, 2003) traces how in the early stages of the development of modern competitive sport in the period of French colonial rule, sports clubs excluded the indigenous population, maintaining its position of cultural, as well as political and economic subordination. Subsequently, colonial authorities seized on sport as a vehicle for 'integrating' the indigenous population into the colonial project (Dine, 1996;Fates, 1994). However the Algerian Muslim population also sought to use sport for its own purposes as a vehicle for expressing resistance to French rule, as for example when the Gelma Club adopted black as its clubs colour in protest against the massacre of 8 May 1945 in which it is estimated that 45,000 Algerians were massacred in the East of the country (Bennoune, 1991).…”

“…However the Algerian Muslim population also sought to use sport for its own purposes as a vehicle for expressing resistance to French rule, as for example when the Gelma Club adopted black as its clubs colour in protest against the massacre of 8 May 1945 in which it is estimated that 45,000 Algerians were massacred in the East of the country (Bennoune, 1991). In addition, following its declaration of war on France in 1954, the FLN used a football team to represent the Algerian independence movement, with its members drawn from (amongst others) Algerian professionals who were called back from the French League including the high profile Rachid Mekloufi, and the success of this team, in both playing and propaganda terms, is well documented (Dine, 2002; Lanfranchi, 1994).…”