An American sports journalist who recently made headlines in Qatar for wearing a rainbow T-shirt in support of LGBT+ people died Friday while covering the World Cup quarter-finals between Argentina and the Netherlands, organizers confirmed on Saturday.
Grant Wahl, 48, “fell sick in the press box at Lusail Stadium,” a spokesman for the organization’s top committee said.
The journalist immediately received emergency medical treatment and was taken by ambulance to Hamad General Hospital in Doha.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino sent “sincere condolences” from the governing body of world football and the “soccer community” to the journalist’s wife, family and friends.
Wahl wrote a book about David Beckham, covered eight consecutive men’s world championships and worked for the famous Sports Illustrated magazine from 1996 to 2020 before joining CBS Sports in 2021.
According to the North American radio station NPR, the journalist passed out in the press box as the match came to an end.
I had already been to the doctor
A few days ago, Grant Wahl noted in his online newsletter that he had been to a clinic in the media center.
“I was told I probably had bronchitis,” he wrote, adding, “My body has finally given up on me. Three weeks of little sleep, a lot of stress and work can have that effect (…) I felt the upper part of my my chest to take on a new level of pressure and discomfort”.
The journalist’s wife, Celine Gounder, a renowned infectious disease expert who has appeared on television several times during the Covid-19 pandemic, wrote on Twitter that she was “completely in shock”.
State Department spokesman Ned Price tweeted shortly after, “We are deeply saddened to hear of Grant Wahl’s death.”
“Grant has made soccer his life’s work and we are devastated that he and his brilliant pen are no longer with us,” the United States Soccer Federation wrote in a statement.
Ahead of the November 21 USA vs Wales game, Wahl was detained by security personnel at Ahmad Bin Ali stadium for wearing a rainbow T-shirt, he wrote on Twitter. Being gay is a crime in the tiny Gulf Emirate.
Source: DN
