The first sanctions imposed by the International Federation on Sunday were deemed insufficient by several nations, which refused to face the Russians after the invasion of Ukraine.
Three days of silence before a half-hearted decision then a formal exclusion. Sunday evening, Fifa was finally out of the woods to join the mobilization initiated by the world of sport against the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. The body did not have much choice: Sbornaïa was still in the running to take part in the next World Cup in Qatar next November, organized by Fifa. And the pressures in favor of a ban from the selection had multiplied during the weekend. Poland, the Czech Republic and Sweden had in turn announced that they did not want to face Russia at the end of March, during the play-off matches for the 2022 World Cup. Result, Monday at the end of the day, Fifa pronounced the exclusion of the Russian team from the competition.
In its decisions, taken unanimously by the office of its Council on Sunday, Fifa was first careful not to exclude Russia. She preferred to force him to evolve under a neutral banner during the next competitions. On the same principle as during the last two editions of the Olympic Games, this time decked out with the name of “Russian Football Federation”, without singing a Russian anthem or waving a Russian flag. As for the home games of the Russians, they were also to take place “on neutral ground”, wrote Fifa without defining what that could mean.
“Potential exclusion from competitions”
A decision “totally unacceptablehad fulminated Poland through its president of the Polish Football Federation, Cezary Kulesza. We are not interested in participating in this match of appearances. The Polish national team will NOT PLAY against Russia, regardless of the name of the team»he reacted.
Position shared by the Czech and Swedish federations: both assure that they intend to maintain their refusal to face the Russians at the end of March. The Swedish Football Association (SvFF) said to herself “disappointed” most “determined to continue working with other federations to cancel Russia’s games in the next World Cup qualifiers”ensures the instance, which “cannot watch in silence and not act when countries are attacked in a completely unjust way”.
Poland was to challenge Russia on March 24 in the 2022 World Cup play-offs. This could be the case with Sweden or the Czech Republic five days later if the Russians qualified for the final play-off confrontation. Faced with the outcry, Fifa said on Monday that it had “engaged in dialogue” with these three federations, and suggests that it reserved the right to take further action. She evoked the hypothesis of a Russian exclusion, assuring that she would continue to “determine possible sanctions, including a potential exclusion from competitions, which will be applied in the near future if the situation does not improve quickly”. A perspective that is the subject of “advanced discussions” this Monday according to a source with knowledge of the discussions, quoted by AFP. The verdict finally fell a few hours later.
On Sunday, the president of the powerful French federation, that of the 2018 world champions, was one of the first to say he was in favor of this outcome. “The world of sport, and especially football, cannot remain neutral. I will certainly not oppose an exclusion of Russia” launched in an interview at Parisian Noël Le Graët, president of the French Football Federation (FFF), also a member of the FIFA council. Later that same evening, the FA announced that they would boycott all scheduled games against Russia in “near future”.
Fifa had little choice: either it followed the position of exclusion from the World Cup, shared by many other selections, even if it means depriving Russian players of a chance to play in the biggest football competition next November, or she had to record the withdrawal of the Polish, Swedish and Czech selections for the March play-offs and de facto qualify Russia. The second option would have finished tarnishing the already lackluster image of the body with the public. “All national teams should follow our example, had warned the goalkeeper of Poland, Wojciech Szczesny, at the microphone of the DAZN channel, like that we will see if Fifa has the balls to give a place to the World Cup to Russia by default. I do not think so.”
Update at 6:50 p.m. with the decision to exclude Russia taken by Fifa.