If radical Sparta soccer hooligans kept their word, thousands of the club's fans and most of its players would not be alive today.

When the team signed French midfielder Ludovic Sylvestre from powerhouse FC Barcelona prior to the start of the Gambrinus liga season, he was clearly not welcome.

The reason was simple: Sylvestre is black.

Many Sparta fans — who have a history of racist behavior — did not hesitate to dole out death threats to the club's players and fans.

"Death to the players who pass the ball to him! Death to the fans who cheer for him!" some Sparta fans wrote on the club's fan Web site.

Although Sylvestre has suffered no physical attacks through 12 matches this season, some have booed him and waved banners denouncing him. One, written in his native French, read, "On n'a pas besoin de toi" ("We have no need for you").

Sylvestre says he has paid no attention to the racism, but Sparta management certainly has.

Naturally, most fans want their team to sign the best players, regardless of race, but Sparta's problem was so pronounced that the team hired Sylvestre in part to root out prejudice in its stands, Sparta's Communications Director Lukáš Přibyl said.

"Racism was a problem that we have had to fight against for a while, so we decided to silence racists chants against opponent players by hiring a black player ourselves," he said.

The club has paid some 10 million Kč ($443,853) in sanctions over the fans' racist displays in the past few years.

In the European Champions League last season, chants by Sparta fans against dark-skinned players with Ajax Amsterdam and Swiss club FC Thun cost the club 2 million Kč in fines to the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA).

UEFA then ordered Sparta to close a major part of the Toyota Arena for a Champions League game against Arsenal, the team of French striker Thierry Henry and several other black players. It was the first time that Sparta fans' racism had resulted in such a move, and it cost the team millions of crowns in revenue.

This behavior has been a problem at Czech stadiums since the mid-1990s, when Kennedy Chihuri of Zimbabwe joined former top-division club Viktoria Žižkov and became the league's first black player.

Hooligans, especially Sparta fans, frequently threw bananas at him and poured beer on him.

Brazilian striker Adauto, who played for Sparta's cross-town rival Slavia until last season, also got an earful from Sparta fans, which helped push him out of the league.

"There is racism in Brazil, but the level of racism in the Czech league made me want to go home almost as soon as I got here," Adauto said.

Racist comments allegedly caused a post-game altercation between Sparta team trainer Eduard Poustka and Teplice's black defender, Patrice Abanda, of Cameroon, last year. Abanda claims he was provoked into attempting to physically attack Pouska when the trainer asked him "Why do you foul so much, you black boy?"

Dark-skinned players aren't the only target of rowdy Gambrinus liga fans.

Throughout the league, Slavia Praha faces chants of "Jude Slavia," a nonsensical anti-Jewish epithet. Slavia has no historical connection to Judaism.

Last February, supporters of Gambrinus liga's FK Most protested against signing three black players by waving a banner that said, "Nejsme cizinecká legie" ("We're no foreign legion"). The "S" on the banner was shaped like the lightning-bolt letters of the Nazi Schutzstaffel, or SS.

Standing ovations

Sparta's Přibyl also holds regular meetings with fans in which he discourages them from racist behavior.

"We hope that this could work better than a threat of sanctions," Přibyl said.

The club monitors fan behavior in the stands with closed-circuit cameras during the home games and reports incidents to the police.

A new law and new league regulations could help curb the problem, too.

Hooligans could end up behind bars for up to three years and receive a lifetime ban from sporting events, thanks to a law that took effect Oct. 1.

Also, the Czech Football Association (ČMFS) agreed to follow anti-racist sanctions set last spring by the game's world governing body, FIFA.

FIFA announced the measures this March that penalize clubs whose supporters commit "acts of racism or discrimination in football." Punishments range from match suspensions and point deductions to elimination from competitions.

"The first such disturbance [from the stands] could bring about a deduction of three points, and should it occur repeatedly, we could even disqualify a club from the competition," ČMFS General Secretary Petr Fousek said.

Sparta hopes that signing Sylvestre will help bring a happy end to the team's dark history. There are some signs that things could be headed that way.