The Daily Telegraph

Moral victory belongs to the Germans in hour of defeat

- By Oliver Brown chief sports writer at Khalifa Internatio­nal Stadium, Doha

The image is indelible. Eleven German footballer­s pose for their pre-match photograph not with rictus grins, but with hands drawn across their mouths, suggesting they have been gagged. It matters little that in 90 minutes’ time, they will succumb to an embarrassi­ng 2-1 defeat to Japan. In time, the scars of that result will fade. But the resonance of the protest, of these young men resolving not to acquiesce meekly in efforts to silence their voices, will endure.

As the sun set beneath the desert floor, it felt here in Qatar as if Germany had shown up not simply Fifa, their global governing body, but the rest of the world. Remember how, just 48 hours earlier, at the same stadium, England had confronted an identical moral conundrum and quailed.

The pre-world Cup message from Gareth Southgate was that nothing could dissuade Harry Kane from running out in Doha with a “Onelove” rainbow armband, or from expressing distaste for the host nation’s laws.

And all it took, ultimately, was a threat of a yellow card for any such idea to be shelved.

On the surface, an armband seems a cosmetic, futile means of trying to redress stringent laws against homosexual­ity in an ultra-conservati­ve Islamic culture. What is truly admirable, though, is Germany’s refusal to back down. Where England, Wales, Holland and Denmark had all fallen obediently into line at the first sign of Fifa discontent, the four-time world champions stayed the course. That, surely, is what true moral courage demands.

Germany proved it was possible to mock the diktats of Gianni Infantino, the Fifa president, with a little ingenuity. Pictured clamping their

Germany are alone among the European dissenters in confrontin­g the oppressive might of Fifa head-on

mouths shut, they left no doubt in the eyes of a worldwide audience that they were being forcibly muzzled. In the stands, Nancy Faeser, the German interior minister, sat directly to Infantino’s left with her multi-coloured armband on. You did not even have to agree with her to acknowledg­e that it took some gumption to humiliate the most powerful man in the game at his own party.

“It was a sign we wanted to send out,” said Hansi Flick, the German manager. “We wanted to deliver the message that Fifa is silencing us.” And they did so, unforgetta­bly. It was a signal to the seven other European federation­s that had signed up to the “Onelove” idea to rediscover their backbone, to follow through on the campaign they had begun. They had pledged together to form an alliance. And here were Germany as the last ones standing, the only team to brave the risk of punishment in the prosecutio­n of their cause.

The argument will be made that they would be better advised concentrat­ing on football. After all, an evening that started with a bold protest culminated in the misery of losing to Japan, a setback that threatens their second successive group-stage exit at a World Cup.

Go woke, go broke? Not quite. You can believe that armbands constitute only wearisome virtue-signalling. There is, admittedly, much of this afoot in Qatar, from the rainbow crests on Team USA’S shirts to the all-black strips paraded by Denmark as a mark of outrage at the treatment of migrant workers. But Germany are alone among the European dissenters in confrontin­g the oppressive might of Fifa head-on, in demonstrat­ing that they will not be cowed by Infantino and his band of meddlesome Zurich bureaucrat­s.

Protest has become a diminished art in sport. When American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos performed their Black Power salute at the 1968 Olympics, raising their gloved hands to the sky, it came at enormous personal cost. Both were ostracised in their homeland, with Time magazine re-wording the Olympic credo of “Faster, higher, stronger” as “Angrier, nastier, uglier”. Even Australia’s Peter Norman, the silver medallist who shared the podium, found himself condemned for expressing solidarity.

It was a story of self-sacrifice, of athletes prepared to weather public opprobrium in pursuit of something greater than themselves. And that, we were led to believe, was the example England would be setting in Qatar.

Instead, the quest was abandoned the moment they learnt their captain would receive a booking.

There were other avenues they could have pursued. Kane could have handed the armband to Jordan Pickford, less susceptibl­e as a goalkeeper to incurring a second booking and consequent suspension. Or they could have chosen the German approach, standing with lips pursed in a stark rebuke to Fifa’s edicts about what they should think and how they should act.

Germany’s federation, the DFB, confirmed this had been the intention. “It wasn’t about making a political statement,” it said. “Denying us the armband is the same as denying us a voice.” With those words, they transferre­d intense pressure to England to follow their lead in the two remaining group games against the USA and Wales. Will the Football Associatio­n conjure its own ruse to highlight the team’s strength of moral fibre? Or will it be dictated to by the absurd Infantino?

England might legitimate­ly respond that they would not swap their position with anybody. Where they are sitting pretty after a 6-2 victory, Germany are potentiall­y only three days away from exiting the tournament. But their old adversarie­s do have the distinctio­n of sticking rigidly to their conviction­s.

Yes, Germany’s World Cup ambitions might be ebbing before their eyes. But they have, beyond any doubt, made the moral high ground their own.

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 ?? ?? Japan’s fans savour their country’s 2-1 win over Germany at the Khalifa Internatio­nal Stadium
Japan’s fans savour their country’s 2-1 win over Germany at the Khalifa Internatio­nal Stadium

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