Donald Trump has been handed a sporting rebuttal after his involvement in a controversial refereeing decision. Belgium’s national football team gave an unrelenting two-word response via tweet to the US president following their decisive 4-1 victory in the FIFA World Cup.
Donald Trump hit with brutal response from Belgium
“Overturn this,” read the official X (formerly Twitter) post from Belgium’s national team account. The jab landed squarely on a controversy that had consumed the tournament’s lead-up; one that saw Donald Trump personally phone FIFA chief Gianni Infantino to free a suspended American striker.
Folarin Balogun had gotten a straight red card against Bosnia and Herzegovina for a dangerous tackle. His boot connected with Tarik Muharemovic’s ankle during a chase for a loose ball. Match officials sent him off in the 64th minute, triggering an automatic one-match ban that threatened his availability for the Belgium showdown.
The White House swung into action immediately. Officials consulted the men’s national team, and Donald Trump then made the call. FIFA gave an unprecedented verdict on Sunday, wiping away the suspension for the first time in over six decades.
Trump boasted about the intervention hours before kick-off. “All I did was ask for a review—I didn’t say, ‘You have to do this,'” he claimed. He confessed no knowledge of the sport’s basic rules, admitting he “didn’t know what the hell a red card was” before the episode. Yet he still branded the referee “a little bit suspect” and nudged journalists to “check his past,” offering zero evidence. A Truth Social post followed, thanking FIFA for reversing “a great injustice.”
UEFA responded as Europe’s governing body accused FIFA of crossing “a red line” and condemned the reversal as “incomprehensible and unjustifiable.” The Royal Belgian Football Association demanded answers before Monday’s match. FIFA swatted their request aside, deeming it inadmissible because Belgium had not faced the US during the original incident (via The Daily Beast).
Originally reported by Devanshi Basu on Mandatory.
