Six Ligue 1 players refuse to play with a rainbow on their shirt

Five players from Toulouse, the new French Cup champion, and one from Nantes have refused to play the league match that faces them this Sunday because they will wear rainbow shirts in all the matches of the day.

This is an initiative of the French League that has already taken place in other years and that seeks, for one day, for professional football to participate in the World Day against Homophobia and Transphobia, which is celebrated on the 17th.

The local newspaper La Depeche reports today that the players would be Zakaria Aboukhlal, Moussa Diarra, Farès Chaibi, Saïd Hamulic and Logan Costa, although the latter assured L’Equipe that he has not informed the team managers that he does not want to play.

Those responsible for the team were only aware of the player’s decision shortly before the start of the match, so

On the other hand, the Egyptian attacker of Nantes Mostafa Mohamed also refused to play with the shirt of this day, points out L’Equipe, who assures that this generated a strong discussion between the general manager of the team and the player’s agent, who had to be separated by the president.

Today’s Toulouse-Nantes league match is the revenge of the French Cup final on April 29, which the first team won by a resounding 5-1.

The match was supposed to start at 3:00 p.m. local time today (1:00 p.m. GMT) but was delayed an hour and a half due to the presence of a suspicious package in the grandstand for the visiting fans, which forced a call to the police bomb squad .

In the second division, Donatien Gomis, Guigamp’s Senegalese defender, has also refused to play this day with a rainbow shirt, adds La Depeche.

Last year, the then player of Paris Saint-Germain Idrissa Gueye refused to play the game with the shirt with the colors of the LGTBI + flag, citing personal reasons.

The Ethics Committee of the French Football Federation (FFF) summoned him to an appearance to give explanations, although that body does not have the capacity to impose sanctions for this reason.

Gueye, a Senegalese midfielder, was transferred in the summer of last year to English Everton, where he had already played between 2018 and 2019, for around 10 million euros, according to the French sports press.

In Senegal, homosexuality is prohibited and punishable by 1 to 5 years in prison.

With information from EFE.