Australian footballer Josh Cavallo, who recently came out as gay, fears that he wouldn’t be safe if he went to play for the Socceroos in the Middle East country.”I read something along the lines of that they give the death penalty for gay people in Qatar, so it’s something I’m very scared of and wouldn’t really want to go to Qatar for that. And that saddens me. At the end of the day the World Cup is in Qatar and one of the greatest achievements as a professional footballer is to play for your country, and to know that this is in a country that doesn’t support gay people and puts us at risk of our own life, that does scare me and makes me re-evaluate – is my life more important than doing something really good in my career?”##NAJAVA_MECA_5967330##The 21-year-old Adelaide United midfielder recently revealed that he was gay, becoming the first openly homosexual footballer to come out while still playing in Australia’s A-League.”I’m a footballer and I’m gay. All I want to do is play football and be treated equally. It’s OK to be gay and play football — I want to show all the other people who are struggling and are scared.”His decision to go public won plaudits throughout the footballing world and beyond, with legendary Swedish forward Zlatan Ibrahimovic tweeting: “You are a champion. Football is for everyone. Big respect.” Antoine Griezmann, Marcus Rashford, Raphael Varane, Gerard Pique, David de Gea and many more supported Cavallo on social media.The football world showed Josh Cavallo support after he came out publicly as gay ❤️ pic.twitter.com/iqEb7eL6zx— B/R Football (@brfootball) October 28, 2021 However, going to a country where homosexuality is criminalized could prove dangerous – but not according to the World Cup organisers. The tournament chief executive, Nasser al-Khater said that there will no problems for any member of the LGBT population from enjoying the World Cup.”I would like to assure any fan, of any gender, sexual orientation, religion, race to rest assured that Qatar is one of the safest countries in the world – and they’ll all be welcome here.”Do these assurances also apply to footballers?
