Watford cancel Qatar friendly after fans voice concerns over human rights

:Watford have cancelled a friendly match against the Qatar national team, the English club said on Monday after two supporters’ groups voiced concerns about the country’s human rights record.

The two groups – Women of Watford (WOW) and Proud Hornets – had urged the club to display its support for “all human rights, the LGBT+ community and women’s rights” at the game but the fixture will no longer take place.

“The game was never finalised and it became abundantly clear this was a game not to play; as such, the schedule was revised,” a club spokesperson said in a statement to British media.

Qatar’s Football Association (QFA) said it had received a number of offers from European clubs, including Watford, to play friendly matches.

“After studying the offers… we selected some friendly matches with various European teams and Watford was not among these matches that the team will play,” the QFA said in a statement.

The QFA did not mention the other European clubs involved.

Homosexuality is illegal in the Gulf state – which is hosting the World Cup later this year – while Human Rights Watch says Qatari laws discriminate against women and LGBT individuals.

“WOW and Proud Hornets are delighted that Watford FC has listened to our concerns and cancelled the game with Qatar,” the two groups said in a joint statement on Twitter https://twitter.com/ProudHornets/status/1541372949407666184.

“We look forward to continuing our discussions with the club on all equality, diversity and inclusion issues.”

Watford were relegated from the top-flight Premier League last season after finishing 19th in the standings.

For all the latest Sports News Click Here 

Read original article here

Denial of responsibility! TechAI is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.