Red faces all round

I have to say something about him, you'll have been expecting it, but I'm afraid it isn't especially funny. It's possible to be funny by hitting the same note again and again and again to the point where the repetition becomes the joke, but he's no Stewart Lee. Apart from anything, the author of the joke has to understand that it's a joke.

 Even people as disconnected from the World Cup as my readers will probably know what I'm talking about, but for compositional reasons if nothing else I will explain. "He" is of course Donald Trump, but the story starts with the US striker Folarin Balogun, the player with the easiest name to misspell in the World Cup. He was sent off against Bosnia when he jumped for a ball but landed with his studs on Tarik Muharemovic's heel. This was a significant loss for the American team, after all he'd scored their first goal to add to the two goals he got in the group stage, but they still went on to win and earn a game against Belgium in the next round. They would have expected to play it without Balogun, though, as players who are sent off are suspended for the next game.

But the next day we heard that Balogun's suspension had been lifted, after FIFA activated a regulation that allows a suspension to be postponed for a year. There was no reason for this. It has never happened before for any World Cup game. It turned out Mister Orange had weighed in with his good friend Gianni Infantino, and suddenly the whole thing was about Presidential influence over FIFA decisions.

Infantino denied that Trump's phone call had been a factor, but offered no alternative explanation for FIFA reversing this suspension in particular but none of the others. He's given the 2034 World Cup to Saudi Arabia, so clearly has the morals of a man who would give a World Cup to Saudi Arabia. He'd probably let Darth Vader host a World Cup on the Death Star if the money was right, and wouldn't mind him using the Force to strangle any referees that displeased him. 

So was the sending off correct in the first place? In my view it was a marginal decision, where a red and a yellow could both be defended. Balogun came down hard on the back of Tariq Muharemovic's heel, and the BBC's live match commentary said this:

Nasty one for Bosnia defender Tarik Muharemovic who gets caught on the back of the ankle in a challenge by Folarin Balogun and looks in some pain. It's accidental as the American returns to the ground but it's going to be looked at by VAR. It's gruesome.

And then this.

This is unfortunate. The replays make it look horrendous. Folarin Balogun is off. A huge blow for the USA, today, and potentially going forward.

The American was trying to shield the ball from the defender who nips in front of him and as his foot comes back to the turf it lands on the back of the ankle of Tarik Muharemovic, which twists nastily into the turf. It's an eye-watering replay and Raphael Claus felt he had no choice but to send him off.

So before any of this blew up, the decision was being viewed as debatable, but not obviously right or wrong. VAR backed the referee's decision, but the studio analysts did not. The studio analysts didn't suggest phoning Infantino about it though.

There was a glorious global hoo-hah, the kind we all love, and at the end of it everything was exactly the same. The US played Belgium, with Balogun in the team.

Except it turned out one thing had changed. The American team, the American fans and a good chunk of America were embarrassed.

I think it may be the first time I've ever seen a team lose a match through sheer embarrassment. They tried, the fans tried, the manager tried, they all tried, but at this level if you aren't fully there emotionally and you come up against a team of eleven other elite athletes with righteous indignation fuelling their every step then you're bound to struggle. America were flat, they made basic errors, and they lost. By the end it felt like they were hanging for the final whistle. 

It could have been worse. He cost America a soccer match, but he could have sent in the marines, or annexed Antwerp. By war criminal standards it was a modest infraction. And yet it feels like a significant moment.

I don't think soccer fans are a major MAGA demographic. In general, soccer is more popular with America's other half. There is such a thing as the floating voter, though, even in America, and embarrassment is a feeling that lingers in the mind. When you wake in the night and the thoughts run through your head, what's the worst one? That's right, embarrassment. Just imagine if enough Americans wake up the night before the next election with a distasteful memory tugging at them. Balogun may turn out to be America's greatest hero.