{"id":750571,"date":"2026-07-08T13:35:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T13:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/750571\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T13:35:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T13:35:09","slug":"fifa-suspended-two-us-staff-members-for-world-cup-match-against-belgium-world-cup-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/750571\/","title":{"rendered":"Fifa suspended two US staff members for World Cup match against Belgium | World Cup 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two US Soccer staff members were suspended by Fifa for their team\u2019s World \u2060Cup defeat to Belgium<\/a> on Monday.<\/p>\n

Team manager Sam Zapatka and US \u2060Soccer vice-\u2060president \u200bof security Frank Pannell weren\u2019t allowed at the match. Fifa<\/a> has not given a specific reason for the suspensions.<\/p>\n

US Soccer didn\u2019t \u2060address the cause behind the punishment, although it did say it \u200bwas unrelated to the federation\u2019s \u200cwork in getting Folarin Balogun\u2019s red card suspended<\/a>.<\/p>\n

According to ESPN<\/a>, the \u200cpair were sanctioned because of a violation of Fifa match protocols as well as people having access to areas where they shouldn\u2019t have been. The suspensions were not due to any physical disputes or confrontations.<\/p>\n

Front Office Sports reported<\/a> that the cause of the two suspensions may have been Balogun coming back \u200bon to the field to celebrate the United States\u2019 2-0 win over Bosnia and Herzegovina in the last 32. Balogun was sent off in the second half \u2060of that game. Players who receive a red \u200bcard are \u200bnot allowed to return \u200bto the pitch after their dismissal.<\/p>\n

Zapatka \u200cjoined US \u200bSoccer in \u200b2015 and has been in his current job since 2020. In an April article, Seton Hall University newspaper The Setonian wrote that Pannell previously worked for the Secret Service, the CIA and in the private sector.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two US Soccer staff members were suspended by Fifa for their team\u2019s World \u2060Cup defeat to Belgium on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":750572,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-750571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/750571","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=750571"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/750571\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/750572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=750571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=750571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=750571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}