Iranian journalists takeover World Cup conference, ask US players about 'representing a racist country'
AL RAYYAN, QATAR: Iranian journalists interrupted a World Cup press conference on Monday, November 28 to question US players how they felt about "representing a racist country" before chastising them for incorrectly pronouncing their own nation's name. Iranian media who seemed uninterested in talking about the game that will take place in Qatar's Al Thumama stadium on November 29 bombarded US coach Gregg Berhalter and team captain Tyler Adams with politically inflammatory questions.
The two were grilled extensively about alleged systematic racism in America, the stringent visa restrictions the US has against citizens of Iran, and Uncle Sam's naval presence in the Persian Gulf are some of the topics. During the half-hour news conference, Adams even received criticism from one journalist for pronouncing "aye-ran" with an American accent. The two were probably left thinking as if they had just been subjected to an investigation, reported Daily Mail.
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MEAWW reported earlier, Iran has called on FIFA to ban the US from World Cup 2022 following the United States Soccer Federation's recent social media post. US Soccer reportedly posted an image of Iran’s flag without the emblem of the Islamic Republic to show “support for the women in Iran fighting for basic human rights,” reports Reuters. The image of the Group B standings posted on Saturday, November 26, across US Soccer’s official Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook accounts, which has now been deleted, showed the Iranian flag only bearing its green, white and red colors.
As cited by Daily Mail, a journalist from Iran opened with a question that quickly set the tone for what would turn out to be a very tense conversation. "What percentage of the world's population will be happy if Iran wins this match [versus a U.S. national team (USMNT) victory]?" the reporter questioned Berhalter compelling the coach to attempt conflict resolution. In an effort to sidestep the apparent political ramifications of the topic, Berhalter answered, "For us, it's a soccer game against a good squad - it's not much more than that."
The coach's attempts to get the subject of the conversation back to football were completely ignored. A few moments later, a Press TV reporter who works for an English-language Iranian news outlet said, "First of all you say you support the Iranian people but you're pronouncing our country's name wrong. Our country is named Iran, not ''aye-ran." He later asked, ''Second of all, are you okay to be representing your country that has so much discrimination against black people in its own borders?" Adams politely replied, "My apologies on the mispronunciation of your country," despite the fact that his biological father is African-American and his mother is White. He continued, "there's discrimination everywhere you go... in the U.S. we're continuing to make progress every single day... as long as you make progress that's the most important thing."
Other journalists attempted to redirect the discussion back to the match on the field; one American reporter said specifically that he planned to ask a "soccer question" to provide a little break. The following query, however, from Iranian media, was, "Sport is something that should bring nations closer together and you are a sportsperson. Why is it that you should not ask your government to take away its military fleet from the Persian Gulf?" "I agree, sport is something that should bring countries together... you get to compete as brothers," in his remarks, Berhalter compared the World Cup to the Olympics but refrained from discussing the tense bilateral relations between the United States and Iran. By the end of the discussion, it was evident Berhalter had grown weary of the questions, saying, "I don't know enough about politics, I'm a soccer coach," in response to one concerning the severe US visa regulations for Iranian nationals. "I'm not well versed on international politics so I can't comment on that," he concluded.