The Argentina players celebrated their World Cup win over England with a banner saying “Las Malvinas son Argentinas”, making reference to the 1982 Falklands war.
Argentina were 1-0 down with five minutes to go of the semi-final in Atlanta but rallied and scored twice in quick succession to reach a second straight World Cup final, where they will face Spain in New Jersey on Sunday.
The banner refers to the dispute over the territory, which is referred to as the Falkland Islands in Britain and Islas Malvinas in Argentina, which led to a 74-day conflict 44 years ago. More than 900 people – 649 Argentinians and 255 Britons – lost their lives in the conflict.
Lisandro Martínez and Giovani Lo Celso held up the banner, grinning, and waved to fans in the stands. It was unclear where the banner had come from.
It is not the first time the question of political banners has come up during the World Cup. Last month in Los Angeles, Iranian Americans waved pre-revolutionary flags that are symbols of protest against the Tehran government when Iran played. Those matches proceeded without incident. After beating Switzerland in the quarter-final to set up a meeting against England, some Argentina players could be heard chanting: “For the Malvinas, for Diego [Maradona] and for Leo [Messi]’s last one.”
Martínez said displaying the banner stirred up deep emotions. “I can picture a Malvinas veteran seeing that and weeping,” said Martínez, who has played in England for the past four years with Manchester United. “I don’t know if there might be sanctions or not, but what they did was display that banner and assert that the islands belong to us.”
Teammate Leandro Paredes added: “Sadly, it is a sad part of our history, for everyone involved in that chapter of, I repeat, our history. And it hurts. We knew we were playing for them, too.”
Fifa’s stadium code of conduct bans “banners, flags, flyers, apparel and other paraphernalia that are of a political, offensive, and/or discriminatory nature” inside stadiums. Fifa did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
Giving his reaction, the business secretary, Peter Kyle, said, described the displaying of the banner as “entirely inappropriate”, adding: “Politics needs to be separate from football. In fact, the World Cup has one of its central tenets that politics is separate from football. That is now a matter for Fifa. I expect Fifa to do its investigation thoroughly.”
Argentina’s security minister, Alejandra Monteoliva, said on Tuesday that enhanced security had been discussed at a meeting in the US on Monday. “There will be 1,600 officers. We want the celebration to be peaceful,” she told local radio in Argentina. “The entry of elements that have any type of provocative message, whether of political or racial content, is prohibited.”
