US Soccer Federation chief executive JT Batson made his first public remarks Thursday about the controversy surrounding Donald Trump’s involvement in this summer’s World Cup, participating in a media roundtable with US Soccer chief operating officer Dan Helfrich and Fifa head of global football development Arsène Wenger.
Before the United States’ last-16 encounter with Belgium, Trump revealed that he had made several calls to Fifa president Gianni Infantino, lobbying for a review of US forward Folarin Balogun’s red card in the last-32 match against Bosnia and Herzegovina. Fifa eventually suspended Balogun’s ban but denied that Trump’s repeated calls had influenced that decision.
Asked whether the federation regretted Trump’s involvement, Batson focused instead on the “incredible support” that the team received this summer from Americans and said that the public outcry in regards to Balogun’s foul is indicative of soccer’s changing place in the American sports landscape.
When pressed more specifically on whether the federation had regrets, Batson elaborated a bit further.
“The president is able to do what the president wants to do,” Batson told reporters. “The president is the president of the United States. Obviously we’re incredibly grateful for all the support, for all of our fans across the country, wherever they are and we’re excited about that and we know that that will pay dividends moving forward.”
When Batson was again asked by the Guardian whether the federation regretted Trump’s involvement, the roundtable was brought to a close after about 50 minutes, short of the agreed-upon hour.
“We’re done, we gotta go,” said Batson. “I’m sorry.”
Balogun received his red card after inadvertently stepping on a Bosnia and Herzegovina player’s ankle while vying for possession. After intensive lobbying from Trump and US Soccer, Balogun’s one-match ban was suspended, causing widespread discourse and even outrage among fans and the general public.
Most observers agreed that the US had been hard done by the initial call. Balogun handled the situation gracefully, disagreeing with the call but also suggesting there was little to nothing he could do about it, given Fifa has no mechanism that allows teams to appeal against a red card during the World Cup.
In the end, Balogun’s return mattered little, with the US losing 4-1 to an organized Belgium side, leading some to speculate that the entire ordeal had proved a distraction to the team.
Balogun addressed the situation in an interview with CBS earlier this week. He said he knew the decision would “cause a lot of controversy” and described it as “a lot of outside noise, and that’s hard to avoid”.
“I could almost see within my teammates a bit of nerves because it was something that’s so unique,” he told CBS Mornings. “But the closer we got to the game, I tried to just focus as best as I could.”
