About

Nations and Balls started as a Facebook group among friends discussing the Serbia v Albania Euro 2016 qualifier six years ago. During that match, an Albanian fan flew a drone carrying an irredentist flag over Belgrade’s Partizan stadium, causing chaotic on-pitch scenes and the match to be abandoned.

After years of sharing links that served as near-daily reminders of how politics, nationalism and society interacted with football, we decided to start a small Medium blog to write about it. Now, we’ve launched Nations and Balls as an online sports magazine.

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Nations and Balls

8 months ago

Unfortunately, football clubs and leagues have largely been reluctant to act decisively against extremists within their fan base without the threat of severe punishment. Were Dinamo to possibly face expulsion from Europe, certainly someone would have stopped these dozens of cars from leaving Zagreb. If the current rules don't allow for a ban on Dinamo over Monday's events, these rules need changing.Read more on how Greece’s police and UEFA’s rules proved inadequate to prevent a predictable tragedy this week. ... See MoreSee Less

Another senseless death in the Balkans

nationsandballs.com

Greece's police and UEFA's rules proved inadequate to prevent a predictable tragedy this week.

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Nations and Balls

1 years ago

Indonesia’s getting ready to host next year’s World Cup for under-20s, the first-ever FIFA tournament to be played in their country.However, these plans have been thrown in the air after the unlikely qualification of another nation: Israel. ... See MoreSee Less

Football’s most inhospitable host?

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Indonesian officials couldn't have guessed who would qualify for their FIFA U-20 World Cup. Now, they might be left without a tournament.

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Nations and Balls

1 years ago

Football matches have been held behind closed doors for a variety of reasons. The spectacle of mute stadiums during the pandemic aside, teams are routinely forced to keep their fans out as punishment for their unruly behaviour.Now, we can add preventing a coup to the list, after Moldova’s FC Sheriff was told to play Partizan Belgrade in the company of the Zimbru Stadium’s unused plastic seats. ... See MoreSee Less

But could Putin do it on a cold night in Chisinau?

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Partizan's black and white colours weren't good enough camouflage for some would-be coup plotters. Football matches have been held behind closed doors for a variety of reasons. The spectacle of mute s...

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