With five African nations having qualified for the 2018 Russian World Cup, racist chants directed at Black football players is on the rise in the host country. The anti-discrimination Fare Network and Sova Center registered nineteen racist chants this season alone.

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The number shows a significant increase, up from just two cases the previous season, and ten the year before. Victims of these chants include members of the French squad. Monkey chants were directed at them during a match between Russia in March.

Meanwhile, Bobby Adekanye, a youth player for Liverpool was the target of racial epithets chanted by Spartak Moscow fans. Guilherme Marinato, a naturalized Russian citizen who was born in Brazil, was targeted on two separate occasions by Spartak supporters who kept calling him a monkey.

A regional Russian governor even boasted to the press that the team representing the city of Vladivostok, which receives funds from his administration, will not sign any Black footballers.

However, NBC News reported that the rise of derogatory croons contrast with the fact that overall discriminatory incidents of this nature have declined. Actual cases of racism in Russian football fell to the lowest it has been since the 2013-2014 season.

As the country was not lock, stock and barrel with Western Europe's peculiar form of chattel slavery in the west, and colonization of huge swaths of the globe, some Africans are weighing in on the matter.

Steve from Nigeria, who has lived in the Russian capital of Moscow for four years and Franklin, from Namibia, who's lived there for a year, told the BBC that “the worst thing about Russia” is the weather.

“I'm shivering. I can't feel my legs now,”said Steve, a popular producer of Afrobeat music in country he calls his “second home.” To show his appreciation he told the British news agency that he even composed a song called “spasibo Rossii,” which means “thank you Russia.”

He affirmed that he is “definitely going to go to the opening” of the 2018 World Cup. “I'm sure the (Russian) citizens are ready to welcome people and they are excited.”

Franklin, for his part, said when he walks “down the street and people ask you: What are you doing in Russia? And they want to take pictures with you...It's just the fact that I feel different, I feel exclusive.” He concluded that he, personally, has “never experienced any racism here, but of course Russians are curious.”

Responding directly to the racist chants, Nigeria defender, Byran Idowu, who was born and raised in Russia, said some fans viewed the verbal abuse as a way to distract opposing athletes. “I think most of them do that to put pressure on a player psychologically, maybe so he doesn't want to keep playing...It could just be because someone finds it funny,” the athlete said.

Notwithstanding Steve and Franklin's take on what it's like to be African and living in Russia, the Union of European Football Association, or UEFA, ordered Zenit St. Petersburg to play its next European match in an empty stadium for jeering at injured Leipzig player Naby Keita. Fox Sports reported that the club was also fined 50,000 euros (approximately USD$58,400) for what was deemed racist behavior directed at the Guinean footballer. Another 20,000 euros (approximately USD$23,400) was tacked on for fans who blocked staircases and threw objects.

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While the debate about racism in Russian football heats up prior to the start of the World Cup, Britain's Football Supporters Federation (FSF) has published an official fans' guide advising gay supporters to refrain from openly displaying their sexuality while attending the event.

The organization, which represents over half a million fans, included other tips for gays, lesbians and transgender people during their stay in Russia.

‘Whilst often you are able to behave as you would in the UK, certain things must be treated with caution in societies less tolerant than back home,” the guide noted, according to the Mirror.

And whilst the guide made no reference to UK fan club hooliganism, violent, “behave as you would in the UK” patterns that became so widespread it was dubbed the “English Disease” - it did recommend that “There is no reason not to come to the World Cup if you are LGBT. It is strongly advised that you do not publicly display your sexuality.”

Some 10,000 British fans are expected to participate in the Russian World Cup, which gets underway on June 15.