FIFA faces pressure to discipline Mexico after anti-gay chant returns at World Cup

Mexico’s World Cup campaign opened with a convincing 3-0 win over Czechia on June 25. The scoreline, though, is not what has FIFA reaching for its rulebook.

Fans inside Estadio Azteca were heard chanting “puto,” a homophobic slur directed at opposing goalkeepers during goal kicks, at least three times during the match. One particularly clear instance came around the 40th minute, when Czech goalkeeper Matej Kovar stepped up for a goal kick and thousands of voices rang out in unison.

A 25-year problem that fines haven’t fixed

The chant has been a fixture of Mexican soccer culture for roughly a quarter century, and FIFA has tried just about everything short of a tournament ban to stamp it out.

The Mexican Football Federation, known as the FMF, has already paid dearly for its fans’ behavior. FIFA previously levied fines totaling 140,000 Swiss francs, roughly $178,000, for prior chanting incidents. Cumulative penalties over the years have reached an estimated 10 million Mexican pesos.

Just weeks before the World Cup kicked off, the FMF lost a Court of Arbitration for Sport appeal on June 2 that had sought to overturn those FIFA fines. CAS upheld the sanctions, which also originally included a partial stadium closure order.

The FMF launched an awareness campaign on May 25 urging supporters to participate in “the wave” instead of discriminatory chants during goal kicks.

The co-host complication

Mexico is one of three nations hosting the 2026 tournament alongside the US and Canada.

The chant itself occupies a contested cultural space. Defenders argue that “puto” in this context is not directed at gay people but functions as a generic insult, similar to calling someone a coward. Linguists and LGBTQ advocacy groups have pushed back hard on that reading, noting that the word’s primary meaning is a homophobic slur regardless of the speaker’s intent.

FIFA has consistently sided with the latter interpretation, treating every documented instance as a violation of its anti-discrimination statutes.

What happens next

Fines have clearly not worked. The FMF has absorbed financial penalties for years with no measurable deterrent effect. A fine of $178,000 is a rounding error for a federation participating in a home World Cup, where matchday revenues alone dwarf any conceivable monetary sanction.

FIFA previously imposed a partial stadium closure on the FMF before CAS got involved. The fact that CAS upheld the underlying fines just three weeks ago suggests the arbitration body would not be sympathetic to another appeal.

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