Long Live Football: A Red Card Is a Red Card

Red cards can be harsh, soft, or even incorrect, and the game accepts them all because the punishment is blind. What happened at the 2026 World Cup is something else: a rule manipulated for power, overturning 60 years of decisions with a single phone call.

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I have been sent off exactly once in my life. Sunday football, an elbow strike that I never launched, a referee who thought he had seen something and didn’t hesitate. I complained a lot, but then I walked away. Because that is the entire deal. The card is not an argument. It is actually the end of the argument.

This week, after a sad episode at the World Cup, we were reminded of the importance of such a rule.

An Invention Against Ambiguity

In 1966, during a quarterfinal clash, England and Argentina battled until the moment the referee sent off Argentina’s captain, Antonio Rattín, who refused to leave the pitch. Ken Aston, the Englishman overseeing referees at that tournament, had to walk onto the field himself to help escort the captain off the field.

That night, Aston came up with a solution for the mess while waiting at a traffic light on his way home. Yellow: Slow down; this is a warning. Red: Stop, you are off. No translation needed. No negotiation possible. The cards debuted at Mexico 1970, meaning the same thing to a German referee, an Argentine captain, and a journalist in the last row of the press box.

It is also believed that the violence used by Portuguese players to injure Pelé and eliminate the two-time World Champion was another reason the organizers took action to address brutality.

For sixty years, a red card in a football match meant a suspension for the next one. So when Folarin Balogun stepped on an opponent’s ankle against Bosnia and Herzegovina at the 2026 World Cup and was sent off, there was no appeal—red-card suspensions are automatic, not subject to review.

Folarin Balogun hits Tarik Muharemović in the game against Bosnia. The player was sent off after a VAR review by referee Raphael Claus. Michael Steele/Getty Images

The Suspension of the Suspension

But the US president called the FIFA president to ask about the decision, and FIFA changed its decision: the US player’s red card will not cost him a match. The host nation’s striker in the knockout rounds, after a call from the host nation’s president, is free to play as someone above the law.

The red card was fair, by the way. But that is almost beside the point. Discipline in a global game cannot depend on who you are, where you play, or who speaks for you. And it shouldn’t change whether you call it Football or Soccer.

Henrique Iamarino Avatar

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Henrique Iamarino
I believe in Human decency and the laws of Gravity. Theme designer at Automattic.
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2 responses

  1. hoss Avatar
    hoss

    The (Cristiano) “Ronaldo” rule definitely benefitted the U.S and Balogun, but we can’t act that Balogun was the first to benefit from postponing the suspension.

    Reply
    1. Henrique Iamarino Avatar
      Henrique Iamarino

      Yes, I understand, Hoss. Thanks for commenting. You’re right. It happened before, and it’s terrible either way. But the circumstances were different; one can argue that Qualifier matches and World Cup matches should not be treated as the same competition, and yet they are.

      Here we have a player who received a red card in the same competition and remains eligible to play, while others were suspended in the tournament—this is simply scandalous.

      Reply

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