While we were dealing with the pandemic, the cases of George Floyd and later Jacob Blake, in the United States of America, shook world public opinion on violence related to endemic, systematic racism.

Sport, perhaps like never before, has been a phenomenal vehicle to support the Black Lives Matter movement, born precisely to turn the light on discrimination, to challenge it.

The epicenter of the protest was the US, but also European football for the first time in history  expressed a strong, unanimous condemnation.

More and more players are discovering and enhancing their active role in society, in this 2020 they started those of the Bundesliga - the first major league to take the field after the lockdown - and then many followed them closely, in all countries.

In Italy, the first athlete of a certain appeal to make his voice heard against discrimination was Kevin-Prince Boateng: on 3 January 2013, during a friendly match between his AC Milan and Pro Patria, he decided to leave the field after having heard racist insults from the stands. The game never restarted.

More than seven years after that episode, we decided to start again from Boateng to tell how the consciousness of the players is evolving, where this new era of awareness and participation can go, which has finally arrived.

He is the face of the new issue of Undici, on newsstands from 18 September; it is he who, in our cover story, recounts his experiences and his commitment against discrimination; it is he who says that "the time has come to do more", that now it is up to the institutions, to his colleagues, to those who tell about football, to everyone. The interview is by Davide Coppo, the photos are by Jim C. Nedd, the fashion was curated by Elisa Voto.

The very deep relationship between football, anti-racism and integration was also deepened by Jonathan Bazzi, writer and candidate for the victory of the 2020 Strega prize with his novel Febbre; by Simon Kuper, writer of the Financial Times; and by Nadesha D. Uyangoda V., an expert on migration, identity and racial issues, who has collaborated with Al Jazeera English, The Telegraph, Rivista Studio. Their articles talk about homophobia, the great influence of football players on the media and public opinion, the representation of black athletes, how they are told during and after their career.