Pep Guardiola’s ribbon protest is political symbol, says FA chief

FA chief executive Martin Glenn has spoken out strongly in defence of his organisation’s decision to charge Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola for wearing a yellow ribbon in support of Catalan independence.

Spaniard Guardiola has until Monday to respond to the ruling body’s charge that he displayed a political message. “You can’t have and we don’t want football equipment to display political symbols. That has always been the case,” Glenn said before referring to the recent controversy over British players wearing poppies on their kit.

“The problem we had with poppies is that for some reason a new person at FIFA seemed to think poppies were a political symbol and we fought against that notion and thankfully sense broke out,” Glenn said.

“Things like a poppy are OK but things that are going to be highly divisive are not. And that could be strong religious symbols, it could be the Star of David, it could be the hammer and sickle, it could be a swastika, anything like Robert Mugabe on your shirt, these are the things we don’t want,” he added. “And to be honest and to be very clear, Pep Guardiola’s yellow ribbon is a political stance, it’s a symbol of Catalan independence.”

LONDON:

MATCHES POSTPONED

Two AFC Cup matches involving Iraqi clubs have been postponed until April in the hope that FIFA will lift a ban on the country hosting competitive international games, the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) said on Monday. Al Zawraa were scheduled to host Bahraini side Manama Club on Tuesday, while Air Force Club’s home game against Malkiya of Bahrain was to be held a week later.

The AFC and the participating clubs had given their consent to stage fixtures in Iraq but FIFA are yet to allow the country to host competitive club fixtures of Asian tournaments.

MANAMA: