分类： sports

A bombshell report from The Times of London has thrown global football governance into chaos, after revealing that a single Emirati member of FIFA’s disciplinary committee acted alone to overturn a mandatory suspension for United States forward Folarin Balogun in an unprecedented World Cup decision.

Balogun was sent off during the United States’ Round of 32 knockout match against Bosnia and Herzegovina, which under standard World Cup rules triggered an automatic one-match suspension that would have forced him to miss the Americans’ next clash against Belgium. But just days after senior U.S. officials – including then-President Donald Trump – reached out to FIFA leadership, the governing body reversed the suspension using Article 27 of its Disciplinary Code, a provision that is almost never invoked to overrule automatic red card penalties.

Trump later confirmed he had contacted FIFA president Gianni Infantino to request a review of the red card, arguing that the original sending-off was unfair, but denied placing any formal pressure on the global football body to reverse the ban. Contrary to FIFA’s initial statement that the decision was handled by an independent judicial panel, The Times’ reporting confirms that Mohammad al-Kamali, the chairman of FIFA’s disciplinary committee, made the call entirely on his own, without consulting any of the committee’s 17 other members.

The revelation has sparked new questions about potential conflicts of interest, coming shortly after the U.S. government announced a major loosening of export controls on the United Arab Emirates, a close U.S. diplomatic ally. The relaxed rules open the door for easier exports of sensitive military hardware, commercial satellites, advanced artificial intelligence chips, and unmanned aerial vehicles to the Gulf state.

Additional reporting from the Financial Times further undercuts claims of collective procedural fairness, revealing that 110 of the disciplinary committee’s most recent published decisions were also issued solely by al-Kamali. Notably, the Balogun decision itself has never been made public, a departure from standard transparency protocols. When contacted by the BBC for comment on the case over the weekend, al-Kamali declined to answer any questions.

This decision marks the first time an automatic red card suspension has been reversed since the rule was introduced for World Cup play, a break with precedent that has sparked fierce backlash across European football. UEFA, the European governing body for the sport, issued a rare public rebuke, calling the overturn “unprecedented, incomprehensible and unjustifiable.” For his part, Infantino acknowledged that Trump had reached out about the case but maintained that the process was handled independently by competent FIFA bodies.

Despite the reprieve that allowed Balogun to play against Belgium, the United States ultimately exited the tournament after a lopsided 4-1 defeat to the European side. Many football commentators have noted that the controversial decision appeared to galvanize the Belgian squad, who channeled public anger over the ruling into their dominant on-pitch performance.

BIRMINGHAM, England – In a high-profile shakeup to England’s senior men’s cricket setup, former Test team head coach Brendon McCullum has publicly apologized to English cricket supporters after being removed from his red-ball coaching role, while confirming he will retain his position leading the national side’s limited-overs formats.

The New Zealand-born coach, who revolutionized England’s Test playing style with the high-risk, aggressive approach nicknamed “Bazball” alongside captain Ben Stokes, was relieved of his Test duties on Sunday, just under three years after taking the post in 2022. McCullum pushed back on an earlier statement from the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) that implied he stepped down voluntarily, confirming publicly on Monday at Edgbaston that he was dismissed from the role.

“Yeah, I got a tap on the shoulder,” McCullum told reporters, speaking 24 hours before England was set to kick off a one-day international series against India at the same ground. “I was disappointed but at the same time I fully respect the decision. We’re in a results business and fundamentally our results weren’t good enough. It’s time for someone else to have a go.”

McCullum’s tenure as Test coach got off to a historic, explosive start: his aggressive batting philosophy re-energized global interest in the five-day format, and England notched 10 wins in his first 11 matches at the helm, bringing immediate acclaim to both McCullum and Stokes. For two years, Bazball was hailed as a game-changing shift that injected new life into stagnant Test cricket.

However, as key veteran players retired from the international side, results declined sharply over the final stretch of McCullum’s tenure. England dropped seven of its last nine Test matches, including a 2-1 series defeat to New Zealand last month – the result that directly led to Ben Stokes’ surprise retirement from Test cricket. Beyond the late losing streak, McCullum’s side never managed to secure a win in major flagship series against the world’s top two ranked sides, Australia and India: England drew both home series 2-2, and lost on the road against both nations.

As the figurehead leading the team’s strategy and culture, McCullum said he takes full responsibility for the underwhelming results, and issued a direct apology to fans. “We just weren’t quite able to win those big series, against India and Australia. For that I guess I can only say sorry,” he said. “I was the leader of that group. I was in charge of the team culturally, in charge of the team tactically, in charge of the team results-wise as well. I’ve been around this game for 20-odd years and I know if you aren’t getting the results someone else needs an opportunity. I put my hand up for that and accept it wasn’t good enough.”

McCullum noted there was a poetic symmetry to the timing of his exit, coming less than two weeks after Stokes’ emotional farewell from Test cricket at Trent Bridge. He shared that he had received warm messages from his former captain, framing their joint departure as a fitting end to their partnership that redefined English Test cricket. “I got some nice messages from Stokesy,” he said. “I guess, in a romantic kind of way there’s something about Stokesy and me going out together. We started it together and we go out together, and I have no problem with that.”

For generations, Islam has functioned as a divisive political flashpoint across European politics, weaponized by far-right movements and even mainstream factions to stoke anti-immigrant sentiment. But on the world’s biggest football platform, a new generation of Muslim players is quietly rewriting the narrative: proving that their faith is not a foreign import, but an integral, long-standing thread in the European social fabric.

With an estimated 2 billion Muslims across the globe, accounting for roughly one-quarter of the world’s total population, open expressions of Islamic faith at this World Cup – which hosted 13 nations with Muslim-majority populations – should have been unremarkable. What has caught global attention, however, is the number of high-profile faith displays coming from athletes representing European nations with majority-Christian populations, pushing back against the false narrative that Islam and European identity are incompatible.

Take 16-year-old Spanish prodigy Lamine Yamal, the dynamic FC Barcelona forward who became one of the breakout stars of the tournament. After scoring his first-ever World Cup goal against Saudi Arabia, Yamal performed sujood – the Islamic act of prostration in prayer – sending headlines across global sports media. This was not the first time the teenager’s faith had drawn controversy: earlier that year, during a friendly between Spain and Egypt held in his hometown of Barcelona, sections of the crowd launched a xenophobic chant: “Who doesn’t jump is Muslim.”

Yamal did not stay silent in the face of the provocation. Taking to social media, he wrote: “I am Muslim alhamdulilah… Football exists to entertain and lift people up, not to disrespect others for what they believe.”

That incident was far from an isolated case. It grew out of a long-running political trend across Europe, where far-right groups – and increasingly, segments of mainstream political parties – have pushed a false binary: framing a “Christian Europe” that must defend itself against the supposed foreign threat of Islam. This narrative overlooks a core historical fact: both Christianity and Islam emerged from the same Arabian Peninsula, with Islam arising just six centuries after the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

Yamal is not the only European Muslim footballer who has been forced to push back against othering from political actors and fans. In 2024, Germany center-back Antonio Rüdiger, a practicing Muslim, shared an Instagram post marking the start of Ramadan, in which he raised his index finger in tawhid, the universal Islamic gesture symbolizing the oneness of God. What should have been a harmless, personal expression of faith instead prompted a scathing, false attack from Julian Reichelt, editor-in-chief of German tabloid *Bild Zeitung*, who falsely claimed the gesture was a symbol of support for the Islamic State group.

Rüdiger responded by filing a defamation lawsuit against Reichelt, accusing him of defamation and incitement to religious hatred, though public prosecutors later dropped the proceedings.

Just days before Yamal’s goal against Saudi Arabia, another European-based player celebrated a World Cup goal with sujood: Yasin Ayari, who scored the opening goal for Sweden against Tunisia. Ayari, who has Tunisian roots, had long been courted by the Tunisian Football Federation to switch his international allegiance. Out of respect for his father’s home country, he followed his celebration with a quiet gesture asking for forgiveness. Even so, his act of faith and muted celebration sparked fierce backlash, with Jimmie Åkesson, leader of the far-right Sweden Democrats, publicly refusing to recognize Ayari as a Swedish citizen. Social media was flooded with hostile criticism of both the player and his expression of faith.

In reality, Ayari’s journey tells a far different story than the one pushed by anti-immigrant politicians: it is proof that Islam is already part of modern Europe, and that the overwhelming majority of immigrants and their children integrate fully into their home societies. It was Ayari’s own Tunisian-born father, Azouz, who encouraged him to represent Sweden, telling Swedish outlet *Aftonbladet*: “My children are part of Sweden. They were born here, their friends are here. I’m an immigrant, but Yasin is Swedish with a Tunisian background. He has every right to play for this country. I really want him to play for Sweden. He should feel that he can give back to the nation that took care of him, that gave him schools, opportunities, that raised him. Why would I interfere? I’m so happy for him.”

While Ayari, Yamal and Rüdiger inherited their faith from their immigrant families, a growing number of European-based footballers have chosen to embrace Islam through conversion, adding another layer to the story of Islam’s place in modern Europe. Some of the biggest names in the sport count themselves among this group: four-time UEFA Champions League winner Clarence Seedorf, a former Netherlands midfielder; French-Malian striker Frédéric Kanouté; and 2018 World Cup-winning French midfielder Paul Pogba.

More recently, Djed Spence, a left-back who represented England at this World Cup, became the first openly Muslim player to earn a cap for the men’s senior national team, making his debut in World Cup qualifying against Serbia in 2022. “I was surprised because I didn’t know I was the first, so it’s a blessing,” he said after England’s 5-0 win. “It’s good to make history and hopefully inspire young kids around the world that they can make it as well. They can do what I am doing.”

The reach of European-based Islamic conversion even extends to this World Cup’s most surprising underdog story: Cape Verde, the tiny Atlantic archipelago nation that captured global hearts after pulling off incredible upsets against Spain and Uruguay to advance out of their group, nearly knocking out eventual champions Argentina. The overwhelmingly Roman Catholic nation drew heavily on its diaspora for its squad, with nearly half of its players born outside the country, many of them raised in Europe. Three members of the squad converted to Islam during their time playing professionally in Europe.

Jamiro Monteiro, the 32-year-old midfielder who first represented Cape Verde in 2016, converted to Islam five years ago while living in his native Rotterdam, Netherlands. French-born teammates Logan Costa and Steven Moreira followed similar spiritual paths, converting during their professional careers. “I was interested in religion from a young age and read about Islam, then later I was living with a fellow player that was Muslim and he encouraged me to start praying with him. That’s when I started to feel something inside me,” 25-year-old defender Logan Costa explained of his journey, which concluded with his formal conversion in 2020.

Moreira, 31, the 2024 MLS Defender of the Year, shared a similar origin story. “I was in an academy in Rennes and I used to room with one of my friends. We did something wrong and they separated us and they put me with an older player,” he recalled. That older player was Abdoulaye Doucouré, the former Everton midfielder and a practicing Muslim. Watching Doucouré pray five times a day and fast during Ramadan sparked Moreira’s curiosity. Before long, he was asking questions, exploring the faith, and eventually embracing it himself. “I could feel something was moving for me but you’re a bit scared because you weren’t raised with that. You don’t know how your family will react … but when I told them, they said: ‘You’re a better person now.’ Alhamdulillah.”

The three players celebrated Monteiro’s opening goal at the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations with a joint sujood, and their shared faith has only strengthened the unity of the Cape Verdean squad. “Whether we are Muslim or Christian our strength is that we are together – we are all Cape Verdean,” Costa said ahead of the team’s historic World Cup run. The squad has fully accommodated the three players’ faith, providing halal food throughout training camps and tournaments, and views their different religious identities simply as a natural outcome of their diaspora roots, raised across European communities.

Against a backdrop of rising anti-Muslim rhetoric across European politics, these players – through their performances, their courage, and their open expressions of faith – are building a new, more inclusive narrative of what it means to be European in the 21st century.

The iconic Lord’s Cricket Ground, long known as the global “home of cricket”, made history on Monday when it hosted its first ever women’s Test match, and it was India that walked away with a dominant 270-run victory over host nation England.

Entering the fourth and final day of the one-off Test, England held a 130-6 score on the batting board, facing an enormous target of 457 runs to claim a win. That mark already stood as more than double the highest successful fourth-innings chase in the entire history of women’s Test cricket, leaving the home side with an uphill battle from the first ball of the day.

It took India barely 90 minutes to seal the historic win, with spin bowler Sneh Rana delivering the two most pivotal blows of the final morning. Rana first removed England’s highest run-scorer Amy Jones, who had notched 54 runs before being sent back to the pavilion. Shortly after, all-rounder Deepti Sharma claimed two quick wickets to whittle down England’s tail end, leaving only lower-order batters Sophie Ecclestone and number 11 Lauren Filer at the crease.

In a display of stubborn resistance, Ecclestone notched her first ever Test half-century during a last-ditch partnership with Filer, but Rana ended the stand by bowling Ecclestone exactly at the 50-run mark. England was bowled out for 186 all out, handing India the lopsided 270-run win.

Beyond the final result, the landmark match produced a string of personal firsts for players at the historic ground. India’s fast bowler Kranti Gaud made Lord’s lore when she became the first woman ever to have her name added to the venue’s famous honours boards, earning the distinction for a five-wicket haul in England’s first innings. Yastika Bhatia later joined Gaud in the history books, scoring 113 runs to notch the first women’s Test century at Lord’s. For England, Ecclestone also hit a personal milestone, claiming a five-wicket haul of her own during India’s second innings as the visitors worked to build their match-winning advantage.

The match marked the final international appearance for England’s Tammy Beaumont and former captain Heather Knight, who announced their retirement from national team duty ahead of the Test.

For India, the historic victory comes as a much-needed confidence boost following the team’s early exit from the 2024 Women’s T20 World Cup, where they failed to advance to the semifinal round. For England, the defeat marks the second high-profile disappointment at Lord’s in just over a month, coming after the side fell to Australia in the T20 World Cup final hosted at the ground earlier this month.