Mexican national team appeals again to TAS against homophobic shouting ruling

The Mexican national soccer team appealed again to TAS against the sentence for the homophobic shouting used by the Mexican fans in the matches against Canada and Honduras.

What is the FMF arguing on this occasion?

The Mexican Soccer Federation this time used the argument that the Court of Arbitration for Sport (TAS) did not respect the protocols they themselves established for acts of discrimination. 

With this, there is a small glimmer of hope that the next matches of El Tri will not be behind closed doors and that the fans will be able to come and support their team, which will be playing for a place in the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. 

On this issue, Yon de Luisa, President of the Mexican Soccer Federation, was emphatic in stating that measures will be increased to try to discourage fans who insist on shouting homophobic slogans. 

This type of shouting has so far caused the Mexican national soccer team to play home games behind closed doors. 

And there has even been talk that, if this behavior continues, the Mexican team would be deducted points, which would leave them out of the competition to reach the World Cup.

What is the Mexican national team asking for in its appeal?

The content of the appeal was detailed by Yon de Luisa and is based on the fact that the TAS is not respecting the protocols it established for cases of discrimination in soccer matches. 

According to this, in the match against Canada at the Azteca Stadium, only the first step of the protocol was carried out, which was the announcement through the local sound system, to invite the fans to stop shouting. 

De Luisa stated: "At the TAS we are asking that the processes be respected, the three steps in the stadium and that sanctions be based on the process and not on the first announcement. In the next few days we will have an announcement of what will happen in the stadium, we have to wait for the feedback from TAS and FIFA to know what will happen in the next matches". 

Regarding the sentence that TAS could give with this new legal recourse, the executive added: 

"What we can say is that our procedure has already been carried out and we are waiting for the result, we will see what we have for the next few days to know what will happen in the games on January 30 and February 2." 

What other measures has the FMF proposed to prevent homophobic shouting?

In order to prevent this shout from continuing to appear at Mexican national team matches, the FMF has proposed several measures to prevent this type of actions from taking place in the stadiums. 

But the strongest measure, which seems to have the full support of the FMF, is to give credentials to the fans of El Tri. 

That is to say, to create a register or a database containing the information of those who come to watch the Mexican team's matches.

This is to have greater control over the fans and, at the same time, to identify those who encourage other fans to make this type of offensive shouts. 

Yon de Luisa said that more details on this measure would be provided in the following days, but it seems that it would be the one that the FMF would seek to implement.