Wednesday, June 8, 2026 - Egypt have filed a formal complaint with FIFA following their World Cup defeat to Argentina, demanding the officials at the heart of the controversy be kicked out of the competition.
The defending world champions looked set for a shock Round
of 16 exit in Atlanta on Tuesday before producing a stunning late comeback.
Trailing 2-0 with just 11 minutes remaining, Argentina rallied through goals
from Cristian Romero, Lionel Messi and Enzo Fernández to snatch a dramatic
victory and book a quarter-final clash with Switzerland.
Their match against Egypt was marred by controversies.
The Pharaohs were denied a penalty moments before Julian
Alvarez started the counter that led to Fernández’ late winner.
Alvarez tackled Mohamed Salah inside the penalty box,
appearing to catch his foot before taking the ball. Immediately after, as the
ball broke loose, Alexis Mac Allister appeared to pull Hamdi Fathy. VAR did not
appear to check either incident, with Argentina scoring moments later.
Egypt had already seen a goal ruled out earlier in the game
after Zico capped a wonderful counter-attack. A VAR check deemed Lisandro
Martinez had been fouled in the build-up.
According to Argentina’s TYC Sports, the president of the
Egyptian Football Association, Hany Abo Rida, has demanded a formal
investigation into the refereeing decisions.
As part of his complaint, he has requested that the match
official from Wednesday’s game, Francois Letexier, and his team be excluded
from refereeing for the remainder of the competition.
Egypt are demanding an investigation into their disallowed
goal and the two infringements that took place moments before Argentina’s third
goal.
FIFA are yet to take any decision on Egypt’s request, with
their coaching staff and players furiously accusing the officials and the
competition of favouring the defending world champions.
‘The referee wasn’t good, he was unfair. His injustice was
clear. He persecuted us from the start of the match. He doesn’t want us to
win,’ said Zico, whose goal was chalked off before scoring again later in the
second-half.
‘It was a rigged game. It wasn’t our fault. That referee… it
seems like this match was rigged. We were winning 2-0, and he kept coming at
us.
‘Congratulations to Argentina on another World Cup, it
seems.
Head coach Hossam Hassam also launched an extraordinary
attack on match officials and FIFA, accusing them of going to extreme lengths
to ‘to keep Messi’ in the competition.
‘We looked better than the reigning champions – better in
everything –, but the result was influenced by internal factors on the pitch
and external factors off it,’ he said.
‘Perhaps they wanted to keep the world champion in the
competition. Perhaps they wanted Messi to stay in the running.
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