{"id":904736,"date":"2026-09-25T08:02:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-25T08:02:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/904736\/"},"modified":"2026-09-25T08:02:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-25T08:02:10","slug":"israels-abu-farchi-sent-off-for-gun-celebration-in-nations-league-match-football-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/904736\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel\u2019s Abu Farchi sent off for gun celebration in Nations League match | Football News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"article__subhead\">Israel footballer Sayed Abu Farchi was sent off for goal celebration mimicking shooting a gun in match against Austria.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"avatar\" tabindex=\"-1\" aria-hidden=\"true\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/author\/kevin-hand\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/1790323330_116_PXL_20210627_155635971-1-1696493612.jpg\"   aria-hidden=\"true\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Published On 25 Sep 202625 Sep 2026<\/p>\n<p>Israel footballer Sayed Abu Farchi was sent off for his goal-scoring celebration when he used the corner flag \u2060to simulate a gun after equalizing against Austria in their UEFA Nations League late on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p>The forward\u2019s goal levelled the match 1-1 early in the second half at Raiffeisen Arena in Linz, Austria, his 55th minute header cancelling out Romano Schmid\u2019s first-half penalty.<\/p>\n<p>Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list<\/p>\n<p>The 20-year-old then jogged to the corner, pulled out the corner flag, dropped his right knee to the grass and rested the pole on the back of his left hand before making a firing gesture.<\/p>\n<p>It wasn\u2019t immediately clear if Farchi, who plays his club football in Major League Soccer (MLS) in the United States, was about to simulate a pool cue shot or a weapon, but the action that followed left no one in doubt.<\/p>\n<p>The referee promptly showed the Colorado Rapids forward a second yellow card, just four minutes after his first, leading to a red card.<\/p>\n<p>Under the International Football Association Board Law 12, players can celebrate a goal as they wish, but their celebration \u201cmust not be excessive\u201d and a player \u201cmust be cautioned for acting in a provocative, derisory or inflammatory way\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Austria regained \u2060the lead in the 90th minute through Phillipp Mwene, who netted following a cross from \u200cPaul Wanner. Sasa Kalajdzic added a third goal in stoppage time with a \u200cclose-range \u200cfinish to seal a 3-1 win.<\/p>\n<p>Israel\u2019s participation in the Nations League has prompted fierce backlash from several other competing countries, including the Republic of Ireland, whose football association said its request to avoid future pairings with Israel had been \u2060\u2060<a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/sports\/2026\/9\/19\/uefa-defends-policy-after-rejecting-irelands-request-not-to-play-israel\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">rejected by UEFA<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>A banner with the words \u201cFree Palestine\u201d was also displayed by Austrian fans close to the pitch during Thursday\u2019s match.<\/p>\n<p>Ireland face Israel on Sunday in a match to be hosted at a neutral venue \u2013 Nagyerdei Stadion in Debrecen, Hungary \u2013 before hosting the return fixture on October 4.<\/p>\n<p>Al Jazeera has contacted UEFA and Colorado Rapids for a response to Farchi\u2019s celebratory simulation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Israel footballer Sayed Abu Farchi was sent off for goal celebration mimicking shooting a gun in match against&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":904737,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,3159,2057,596,6897,36089,12241,44,588,85],"class_list":["post-904736","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-austria","tag-europe","tag-football","tag-israel","tag-israel-palestine-conflict","tag-middle-east","tag-news","tag-sport","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/904736","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=904736"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/904736\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/904737"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=904736"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=904736"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=904736"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}