The wife of soccer sportswriter Grant Wahl has confirmed that he died in the press box Friday near the end of the Agentina-Netherlands quarterfinal at the 2022 World Cup in Doha, Qatar. He was 48.
Twitter is crackling with rumors that he was somehow killed by the Qatar Govt, as he had been a persistent critic of Qatar and FIFA. While not implausible, evidence for such a claim seems to be lacking. Wall did write on Monday that he was I’ll with some kind of respiratory infection. “As NPR reported earlier <https://www.npr.org/2022/12/02/1139611812/qatar-restrictions-world-cup-fans-lgbtq-iran-crusaders-football>, Wahl was prevented from entering one World Cup stadium in Qatar in November because he was wearing a rainbow t-shirt. Wahl said a stadium security guard turned him away, "You have to change your shirt. It's not allowed." Wahl said he'd been briefly detained. Qatar has been a controversial host since it was awarded the tournament in 2010. Wahl had been critical of FIFA and Qatar during the tournament <https://twitter.com/GrantWahl/status/1600988143649714178>. In an interview with NPR, Eric Wahl said his brother didn't shy away from highlighting the controversy at the World Cup "He was very critical of FIFA - which is not new for him and very critical how the Qataris were running the games." Eric Wahl said his brother had received death threats while in Qatar because of the rainbow shirt and his continued reporting on FIFA and the Qatari government. (Snip). Wahl had gotten sick while on assignment in Qatar. On Monday he had written <https://grantwahl.substack.com/> he'd visited a medical clinic and the staff believed he had bronchitis. "My body finally broke down on me," Wahl wrote. "Three weeks of little sleep, high stress and lots of work can do that to you ... What had been a cold over the last 10 days turned into something more severe on the night of the USA-Netherlands game, and I could feel my upper chest take on a new level of pressure and discomfort." https://www.npr.org/2022/12/09/1142054844/grant-wahl-soccer-writer-dies-qatar-world-cup?sc=ipad&f=1001 -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/tvornottv/CAKGtkYJCFess_%3DKV52tJdi7%3DM030OUssOjkveSL0FRK6uuOx%3DA%40mail.gmail.com.
