A2 · Elementary
8 min
sports and cultureimmigrationgeopoliticsfootball
A World Cup Without the World
Sin visado, sin partido
Players from Iran, Iraq, and Somalia, along with Somali referee Omar Abdulkadir Artan, have been denied US visas ahead of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Fletcher and Octavio dig into what football means for these nations, the history of politics invading sport, and what it says about America's relationship with the rest of the world's game.
Jugadores de Irán, Irak y Somalia, junto al árbitro somalí Omar Abdulkadir Artan, no pueden entrar a Estados Unidos para el Mundial de Fútbol 2026. Fletcher y Octavio exploran qué significa el fútbol para estas naciones y qué pasa cuando la política cierra la puerta al deporte más popular del mundo.
5 essential A2-level terms from this episode, with translations and example sentences in Spanish.
| Spanish | English | Example |
|---|---|---|
| selección | national team (literally: selection) | La selección nacional representa a todos los jugadores del país. |
| jugador | player | El jugador trabaja mucho para estar en el Mundial. |
| visa | visa | Necesito una visa para entrar al país. |
| árbitro | referee | El árbitro mira el partido y decide las reglas. |
| mundial | world cup; worldwide | El Mundial de Fútbol es muy importante para todos los países. |
Picture this: the FIFA World Cup is happening on American soil, the biggest sporting event on the planet, and some of the players it invited cannot get through the front door.
Sí.
Yes.
Irán, Irak y Somalia.
Iran, Iraq, and Somalia.
Sus jugadores no tienen visa.
Their players don't have visas.
The US government has denied entry to players from those three national teams, and also to a referee, Omar Abdulkadir Artan from Somalia, one of the top officials in African football.
El árbitro es muy importante.
The referee is very important.
Él trabaja mucho.
He works hard.
Y ahora, nada.
And now, nothing.
Before we get into the politics, I want to start with something simpler, which you know far better than I do.
What does qualifying for a World Cup actually mean to a country like Somalia?
Para Somalia, el fútbol es vida.
For Somalia, football is life.
No es solo un deporte.
It's not just a sport.
Say more.
Because I think Americans often hear that and think it's a cliche, but there's something real underneath it.
En Somalia, hay problemas muy grandes.
In Somalia, there are very big problems.
La guerra, el hambre.
War, hunger.
Pero el fútbol une a la gente.
But football unites people.
La selección nacional es el país.
The national team is the country.
Todos juntos.
Everyone together.
That phrase, la selección, I want to come back to that later because there's something in that word specifically.
But yes, you're describing what sociologists call the nation-in-a-jersey.
It's one of the few moments a fractured country becomes a single thing.
Exacto.
Exactly.
Y ahora, no pueden ir.
And now, they can't go.
Es muy triste.
It's very sad.
I reported from Baghdad in the early 2000s.
I remember the afternoon Iraq won the Asian Cup in 2007.
People fired guns in the air, which is terrifying if you don't know the context, but it was pure joy.
The country had almost nothing to celebrate, and football gave them that.
Sí, lo recuerdo.
Yes, I remember it.
Fue increíble.
It was incredible.
Irak ganó y la gente lloró de felicidad.
Iraq won and people cried with happiness.
So here's what I keep turning over.
This World Cup is being held partly in the United States, which means the US has obligations under a FIFA hosting agreement to grant access to all participating nations.
FIFA has rules about this.
Host nations cannot pick and choose.
La FIFA habla mucho.
FIFA talks a lot.
Pero la FIFA tiene poco poder aquí.
But FIFA has little power here.
That's a sharp point.
FIFA negotiated a visa assurance agreement with the US government before awarding this tournament, but there are national security carve-outs, and that's where this falls apart.
Estados Unidos dice: la seguridad es más importante que el fútbol.
The United States says: security is more important than football.
Right, and look, I understand that argument in the abstract.
But Omar Artan is a referee.
He is not a security threat.
Refusing him entry is, at best, clumsy bureaucracy, and at worst, something more deliberate.
El árbitro trabaja para la FIFA.
The referee works for FIFA.
No trabaja para Irán o Somalia.
He doesn't work for Iran or Somalia.
Exactly.
He was selected by FIFA to officiate matches.
He has no allegiance to any of these governments.
The denial makes no sense on a security logic.
Para mí, es una política.
For me, it's politics.
No es una regla.
It's not a rule.
Es una decisión política.
It's a political decision.
Let's go back in history for a moment, because this is not the first time sport and political access have collided.
The 1980 Moscow Olympics, the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, both had boycotts rooted in Cold War politics.
Even the 1966 World Cup in England had nations stay home over FIFA disputes with African and Asian confederations.
Sí, pero esto es diferente.
Yes, but this is different.
Los jugadores quieren ir.
The players want to go.
No pueden ir.
They can't go.
That distinction matters enormously.
A boycott is a country saying no.
This is a host country saying no to others.
That flips the moral logic entirely.
El anfitrión tiene que abrir la puerta.
The host has to open the door.
Es la regla del fútbol.
That's the rule of football.
Now, I've covered Iran for decades.
I know how complicated the government there is.
But Iranian footballers are not the Iranian government.
The players are twenty-two, twenty-three years old.
Some of them grew up dreaming of exactly this tournament.
El jugador no es político.
The player is not political.
El jugador juega.
The player plays.
Es su trabajo.
That's his job.
And there's a particular irony here given the timing.
The ceasefire between Iran and Israel was just announced.
The military situation is, tentatively, cooling.
And yet these players are still being locked out of the country.
La guerra para.
The war stops.
Pero los jugadores no entran.
But the players can't enter.
Muy extraño.
Very strange.
Let me ask you something cultural, because you've been around football your whole life in a way I genuinely haven't.
When Spain plays in a World Cup, what is it like in Madrid?
What does the city actually feel like?
Las calles están vacías.
The streets are empty.
Todo el mundo mira el partido en casa o en un bar.
Everyone is watching the match at home or in a bar.
Cuando España gana, la gente sale a la calle.
When Spain wins, people go out into the street.
Es una fiesta grande.
It's a big celebration.
I was in Madrid the night Spain won in 2010.
I thought the city had lost its mind in the best possible way.
There were strangers hugging each other on the Gran Vía at two in the morning.
Eso es el fútbol.
That is football.
No hay diferencias.
There are no differences.
Solo hay alegría.
There is only joy.
Which makes what happened to these players feel like something more than a visa technicality.
It's a denial of that specific experience, that thing you just described, to people from countries that have had very few chances to feel it.
Para Irak o Somalia, el Mundial es muy raro.
For Iraq or Somalia, the World Cup is very rare.
No pasa cada año.
It doesn't happen every year.
Somalia qualifying for a World Cup is, depending on when you're listening to this, a genuinely historic thing.
This is a country that has been in one form of civil war or another for most of the past thirty years.
Their football federation was barely functional a decade ago.
Por eso el árbitro Omar Artan es importante también.
That's why referee Omar Artan is also important.
Es de Somalia.
He is from Somalia.
Trabaja para el mundo.
He works for the world.
He is the best argument against the security framing.
He was certified and vetted by FIFA, by UEFA, by CAF.
He is exactly the kind of person the World Cup is supposed to celebrate.
Turning him away is not caution.
It's something else.
Oye, antes dices la selección.
Hey, before you said la selección.
¿Sabes por qué decimos selección y no equipo?
Do you know why we say selección and not equipo?
I assumed they were interchangeable, but that look on your face tells me I'm about to learn something.
Un equipo es cualquier grupo.
An equipo is any group.
Un equipo de trabajo, un equipo de fútbol del barrio.
A work team, a neighborhood football team.
Pero una selección viene de seleccionar, elegir.
But a selección comes from seleccionar, to choose.
Son los mejores del país.
They are the best in the country.
So the word itself carries something, doesn't it.
It's not just a team.
It's the chosen ones.
The people picked to stand in for the whole country.
Exacto.
Exactly.
La selección nacional representa a todos.
The national team represents everyone.
A toda la gente.
All the people.
That changes the weight of this story for me, honestly.
When you deny the selección entry to a World Cup, you're not just stopping some athletes from playing a game.
You're telling an entire country: the people you chose to speak for you are not welcome here.
Sí.
Yes.
Y el fútbol no tiene la culpa.
And football is not to blame.
El fútbol es inocente.
Football is innocent.
That might be the line of the whole episode.
I'm going to remember that.
The game itself is innocent, and somewhere in that gap between the game and the politics around it, these players are stuck.