England sent Mexico and its anti-gay ‘puto’ chant crashing out of the World Cup
Mexico and their puto-chanting fans were utterly embarrassed by England in the World Cup, despite playing 11 vs. 10 for the second half.
Mark
England embarrassed Mexico in its home stadium in a 3-2 World Cup thriller on Sunday that featured Mexico fans yelling their anti-gay “puto” chant throughout the match.
Outside of more wins for the USMNT, there won’t be a more pleasing match result for many gay fans this World Cup.
Despite playing in Estadio Azteca in Mexico City — essentially the home stadium for the Mexico Team — Harry Kane, Jude Bellingham and England led the match most of the way, going up 2-0 and keeping the lead through 11 minutes of stoppage time and down one player.
When the dust had settled, Mexico and their homophobic-chanting fans were sent packing from this World Cup, of which the country has been an embarrassing host.
Bye gurl bye.
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The loss was such a heartbreaking result for the host nation — despite England being slightly favored by the general betting public — that Mexico’s national team manager Javier Aguirre stepped down shortly after the match.
To be sure, Mexico fans unloading their anti-gay chant on the stadiums in which Mexico has played its FIFA World Cup matches — and stadiums for over a decade — isn’t the fault of Aguirre. He inherited the mess, the result of years of failure by FIFA and the Mexican Football Federation to stop it.
Mexico should face huge FIFA punishment for puto chant
While so many Mexico fans wear the anti-gay chant at soccer matches as a badge of honor, they may soon get a stronger taste of the repercussions on the world stage of their refusal to stop the celebration of homophobia they refuse to put in their past.
FIFA cannot ignore the chant that echoed throughout the stadium many times throughout the match against England. Days earlier, the fans yelled homophobia with FIFA President Gianni Infantino in attendance for the match.
He heard it first-hand.
Mexico has in the past been ordered by FIFA to play matches in empty stadiums and pay heavy fines due to the inherently homophobic chant so many fans refuse to stop.
Next up, FIFA should take their response to the next level.
Mexico should be docked World Cup qualifying points by FIFA ahead of the 2030 World Cup. And if the fans keep up the chant as they have in at least most, if not all, of their 2026 matches, Mexico should be banned from competing at this historic upcoming World Cup, which will be hosted by Spain, Portugal and Morocco to celebrate the tournament’s 100th year.
There is precedent. Mexico was banned from the 1990 World Cup just four years after hosting the tournament in 1986, due to alleged cheating on the world stage at the youth level.
In all, 17 countries have been banned from the FIFA World Cup over the last 50 years, for several different reasons. One of them was South Africa, which was banned for racial discrimination for many years.
To be sure, that should be the cost of this chant. It has seeped into so many corners of Mexico soccer fandom, it even forced Outsports contributor Ken Schultz to come face-to-face with it in a small bar in Chicago.
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Mexico fans can now yell puto chant from home
Make no mistake, despite some apologists claiming “there’s no homophobia here,” the very root of the word — a man paid to sleep with men — shouted as an insult is homophobia. Period.
Homophobia is the root of the “puto” chant, no matter who tries to make excuses.
Despite soccer being intrinsic to sports culture in Mexico, and the country hosting the tournament and every one of the El Tri matches this year, Mexico hasn’t been able to reach the World Cup quarterfinals in 40 years.
Mexico even played the final 40 minutes of the match with 11 players against 10 players for England due to a red card, and they still couldn’t win.
Embarrassing for Mexico.
It will be interesting to see what FIFA does next with a fanbase that utterly refuses to change its collective behavior.
For now, we can celebrate Mexico fans yelling their chant from their couches.
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