It could've happened to any of us. Every sensible person has looked at those cute little flattened cones used in sports drills and thought, Hey, that reminds me of the conical hats used for sun protection across Asia, so why don't I put that on my head, make a slanted-eyes gesture, and snap a picture to tweet unprompted from the corporate account of my prominent Italian soccer club?
It's easy to see why Juventus FC Women, winners of four straight Serie A titles, both captured and publicly disseminated the above image of defender Cecilia Salvai on Thursday, along with a considered emoji combination. While most soccer racism is in the service of demoralizing the opponent, this one's out of pure love of the craft. Anyway, the club is sorry that they may have offended anyone.
This is technically accurate: no racial undertones, just overtones.
