Other teams also protest against the hasty production of FIFA
Today’s match against Ghana with a new armband
It was Son Heung-min (Tottenham)’s captain’s armband that those who cheered for the first leg of Group H against Uruguay on the 24th felt sorry for them.
It would be annoying with just the face shield, but it was because the armband kept slipping down and it seemed like he couldn’t concentrate on the game. Eventually, Son Heung-min took off the armband and held it in his left hand to run. Portuguese captain Cristiano Ronaldo did the same. German captain Manuel Neuer (Bayern Munich) also said, “It is too loose. It doesn’t seem like it was made by a good company,” he complained.
In fact, this captain’s armband was made in a hurry to fill in instead of wearing the ‘One Love’ armband with a rainbow-colored heart and the number ‘1’, which captains of seven European teams, including England and Germany, were forbidden to wear. The International Football Federation (FIFA) stipulates that the equipment used by players must not contain phrases or images with political or religious meaning. But in reality, it was because Qatar, the host country, openly discriminated against LGBTI people.
FIFA has captains of national teams play the group stage wearing armbands with slogans such as “#Football uniting the world” and “#No discrimination” written on them. The slogans are different for each stage of the tournament. The problem was that due to the hasty production, it kept flowing down and preventing us from concentrating on the game. There were also complaints that there was only one size and that it could not be adjusted.
Ultimately, FIFA decided to remake the armband. An official from the Korea Football Association introduced on the 26th, “We have talked about it, and I know that other teams have also raised issues.” It is expected that he will wear a new armband in the match against Ghana in the second round of Group H on the 28th.
Lim Byung-seon Senior Reporter