The Mexico national Football team are gearing up for their World Cup qualifiers but they will have to play in an empty stadium.
FIFA bans Mexico fans
The Mexico fans will not be allowed to cheer for their National team during the World Cup qualifiers as they used homophobic chants in the past. It is noted that Mexico’s national team will also be fined $73,000.
Recently, the FIFA Disciplinary Committee made an announcement stating that the Mexican National Team will have to play its two upcoming World Cup qualifier matches against Jamaica on September 2 and Canada on October 7 in an empty stadium.
Mexico fans have been accused of using homophobic chants at the Olympic Tournament Qualifiers against the Dominican Republic and the USA in March.
Mexican Football Federation president Yon De Luisa addressed the situation during a press conference on Friday.
De Luisa said, “Let’s stop now, please.The (expletive) chant is discriminatory and is moving us away from FIFA competitions. To those who think it’s fun to yell it out, I have news for you. It’s not.”
Investigations are on-going
It has been noted that the investigations are still in progress and that happened during the Confederation of North, Central America, and Caribbean Association Football Nations League (CONCACAF) games against Costa Rica and the USA earlier in June.
The alleged fans used racist slurs during both of those games and it came to halt to warn the fans. CONCACAF had launched an anti-discrimination campaign in March in order to prevent the homophobic chants but it was of no use.
FIFA had previously announced its own disciplinary code to deal with the offensive chants by the fans back in July 2019. The code states that the officials should give one warning to spectators if offensive chants are used, but if they continue then officials must abandon the match, and players are sent to the locker rooms.
De Luisa said: “There’s a million ways to show interest toward your team.Without discriminating. So we should focus on the positive ways. This is something that we are not proud of. This is not the image that we want to show from our fans and from our society to the rest of the world.”
There have been controversial incidents involving the Mexican fans in the past as well and it has led to multiple fines and threats to the national team.