Pope presides over sportsmans' jubilee

Serie A takes a break this weekend at the behest of the Pope. Tomorrow, in the presence of His Holiness, Pope John Paul II, the Italian national team will play a side including foreign players currently competing in the Italian League.

Serie A takes a break this weekend at the behest of the Pope. Tomorrow, in the presence of His Holiness, Pope John Paul II, the Italian national team will play a side including foreign players currently competing in the Italian League.

The exhibition match has been arranged in Rome's Olympic stadium as part of the Jubilee of the Sportsman, an acknowledgement by the Catholic Church of the importance of physical activity and competition for a better development of youth.

The Pope will watch from the VIP stand and broadcast worldwide by Italian television.

Yesterday, the Pontiff, who played in goal for his high school football team in Wadowice, met players from Lazio, who have been in the spotlight recently over racism allegations. He greeted the players as "sky-blue and white friends", a reference to the colours which Lazio's founders, aspiring to Olympic ideals, adopted from the Greek flag 100 years ago. He said the club had written "a very interesting page in the book of Italian sport" since being founded by a retired army officer in January 1900.

The party yesterday included the Yugoslav defender Sinisa Mihajlovic, who issued a public apology two days ago for his racial taunting of the Arsenal midfielder Patrick Vieira in the Champions' League last week.

"Sometimes, unfortunately, the sporting world is hit by episodes that damage the real significance of competition," the Pope said. "In particular, passionate support for a team must never reach the point of insulting people and damaging the collective well-being."