Denmark’s football team have had a request for their players to be permitted to wear shirts in favour of human rights at the World Cup has been rejected by FIFA. The Danish football federation had asked if its players could wear shirts with the words “Human Rights for All“.
FIFA, the worldwide football governing body, has insisted that no political messages are allowed in the games and that teams should “focus on football”, the Danish football federation disputes that it is a political message but accepted FIFA’s decision.
Danish football federation director Jakob Jensen told Danish agency Ritzau:
“For me, this is a jersey with a very simple message about universal human rights,”
“It is Fifa’s right as organiser of this tournament to say that we can’t do it. Fifa of course does this to prevent all sorts of weird stuff. We don’t think it was that strange.”
“We don’t think there’s any politics in it. We think that the human rights are universal, and we stand by this view. Fifa had a different assessment and sadly we had to take that into consideration.”
Denmark are planning to wear “toned down” kits at the World Cup. Hummel the Danish team’s kit manufacturer, have designed a third all-black kit, which is to represent “the colour of mourning.”
Captains of nine other European teams will wear ‘One Love’ armbands as a message against discrimination, including England’s captain Harry Kane.
An Anglo/Italian sports journalist and author who writes for a number of publications, including The Guardian and Sports Illustrated. Previously a columnist for World Soccer, Jean Paul has appeared on a number of football podcasts including The Guardian’s Football Weekly, he is a Juventus supporter having followed the Bianconeri since first visiting the Stadio delle Alpi in the 1990s.