Ethnicity and football is a description of the global acceptance of association football, with players from many different races and countries participating. While football has moved around the world from its roots in England during the 18th century, the progress of non-European players has sometimes been hindered, with racism a continuing problem in many different countries. People of non-European races have sometimes not been accepted as players in European football. This has changed in recent times, due to societal change as well as campaigning on the part of the race lobby groups. UEFA and the European Union support the Football Against Racism in Europe (FARE) project which aims to stop racism. Globalization Globalisation has created a sense of homogenised culture in football where players from different ethnic backgrounds have congregated in one particular team. This enables the team to form some kind of "supranational" (Maguire J, 2009) entity that in turns loses its local or national identity but gains a mixture of strengths that ideally improves the team's performance. A good example of this are the teams associated to the Premier League based in England. All of these teams are made up of players from different ethnic groups and are considered the best players in the World. Manchester United were crowned FIFA Club World Cup Champions in 2008, which exemplified the importance of ethnic diversity in a team - only three of the players in their championship game were of English background. Globalisation has also affected football from a different perspective. John Nauright (2004) explains that during the globalisation process, local and national identity is celebrated especially during significant sporting events such as the Football World Cup. An estimated 715.1 million people from different countries and ultimately ethnic backgrounds watched the Football World Cup in 2006 which makes it the most viewed event in history. This results in businesses looking for opportunities to advertise their brand through sponsorship and funding which leads to commercialism in football. Commercialism In 1992, Rupert Murdoch and British Sky Broadcasting purchased the rights to televise the English FA Premier League for 304 million English pounds which was 600% more than the previous contract. Feeding off the passionate interest for football, matches were televised all over the world through satellite television which made the league the "crown jewel" of football. Since then aspiring players from different ethnic backgrounds have strived to play in this league to