President Trump responded Thursday to Iran’s sports minister saying that his country cannot compete at this summer’s World Cup, which the US is co-hosting.
“The Iran National Soccer Team is welcome to The World Cup, but I really don’t believe it is appropriate that they be there, for their own life and safety,” the president, who has cultivated a close relationship with FIFA President Gianni Infantino, wrote on Truth Social.
Ahmad Donyamali told Iranian state television Wednesday that “it’s not possible for us to take part in the World Cup” due to what he called “wicked acts” committed by the US during the war that began Feb. 28, including the killing of former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameni by an Israeli airstrike.
The night before Donyamali’s comments, Infantino revealed in a statement on his Instagram page that he had just met with Trump and the commander in chief “reiterated that the Iranian team is, of course, welcome to compete in the tournament in the United States.
“We all need an event like the FIFA World Cup to bring people together now more than ever, and I sincerely thank the President of the United States for his support, as it shows once again that Football Unites the World,” added Infantino, deploying FIFA’s slogan.
Iran, which secured qualification for the World Cup in the summer of 2025, was due to play group-stage games in Los Angeles and Seattle June 15, 21, and 26 against New Zealand, Belgium and Egypt, respectively.
No qualified team has ever withdrawn from the World Cup finals for political reasons since the event was first contested in 1930, though nations have refused to take part in qualifying matches in response to geopolitical events.
Most famously, ahead of the 1974 tournament, the Soviet Union was disqualified for refusing to travel to Chile for the second leg of an intercontinental qualifying playoff following the coup that brought far-right general Augusto Pinochet to power in Santiago.
It’s unclear how FIFA would fill Iran’s spot in the 48-team field, though one option could be to cancel a planned March 31 playoff between Iraq and the winner of a match five days earlier between Bolivia and Suriname, with Iraq taking Iran’s place and the other team taking the spot reserved for the playoff winner.
Iraq’s coach, Graham Arnold, publicly requested this past weekend that FIFA postpone the scheduled March 31 match due to the fact that Iraqi airspace is closed until at least April 1 due to the ongoing Middle East war.
