Nov 4 (Reuters) – FIFA President Gianni Infantino hailed the participation of girls and women in a Hazfi Cup soccer match within the Iranian metropolis of Mashhad on Sunday as an “encouraging growth”.
Female followers have been banned from sporting occasions within the Islamic Republic for the reason that 1979 revolution, with some exceptions, and FIFA confronted calls to expel the lads’s group from the 2022 World Cup over the difficulty.
Infantino favors a coverage of non-public engagement with the nation’s leaders and welcomed the entry to Imam Reza Stadium for some girls and women as a brand new step.
“I used to be very completely happy to study that ladies and women have been collaborating in Iran’s Hazfi Cup match between Nassaj Mazandaran and Shahid Gandhi Yazd,” he mentioned in a social media publish on Monday.
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“This is an encouraging growth following final December’s Iranian Top League match in Isfahan, which drew 45,000 girls and women to the stadium, and the 2023 Tehran Derby, which drew 3,000 girls and women to the stadium.”
Women’s rights group Open Stadium, which led the marketing campaign to exclude Iran from the final World Cup, mentioned a restricted variety of feminine followers have been allowed into Sunday’s match between the 2 lower-league golf equipment.
It additionally famous that the match passed off on the identical stadium the place Human Rights Watch reported that individuals have been forcibly prevented from watching the 2022 World Cup qualifier between Iran and Lebanon.
Last 12 months, the highest league match between Sepahan and Persepolis in Isfahan was performed in entrance of an viewers made up completely of girls and women.
The Iranian Football Federation’s order to exclude male followers was issued after Sepahan cheerleaders led derogatory chants towards Persepolis’ feminine followers over the last Persepolis match at Tehran’s Azadi Stadium in May 2024.
Infantino mentioned he hoped to see additional progress in opening up soccer matches to everybody in Iran and different components of the world the place entry is restricted.
“FIFA’s imaginative and prescient is to make soccer out there to everybody, in all places on the earth, as a result of our sport belongs to everybody who needs to expertise it,” he added.
Iran has already certified for subsequent 12 months’s North American World Cup.