Fifa vice-president Jim Boyce would welcome talks over the FA request for England players to wear poppies against Spain.
Vice president Boyce would welcome FA debate
Fifa vice-president Jim Boyce would welcome further talks between world football's governing body and The FA over their request for England players to wear poppies in the friendly international with Spain.
Fifa will allow a minute's silence at Wembley while the England players will wear poppies on their training kit on Friday. They will also stand for the traditional two minutes' silence to mark the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11 month in an act of remembrance.
However, Fifa will not allow the Three Lions to wear poppies during the game because it contravenes their rules regarding shirt emblems.
The Football Association have once again written to Fifa asking them to change their minds - and Boyce has sympathy with the request.
"I fully understand why The FA has made this request." Boyce told
Sky Sports News. "I understand why Fifa has this regulation because it could be abused if there was not such a regulation in place. But I also feel that where there are individual circumstances, these should be treated separately and judged on their merits."
The International Football Association Board meet once a year to discuss the Laws of the Game, so Fifa alone cannot change its rules.
The FA have made it plain they have no wish to get embroiled in a row over the matter.
However, chief executive Alex Horne has been in contact with the world governing body asking them to reconsider.
"I believe we have sent another letter to Fifa from Alex Horne, making a fresh request for this to be reconsidered. We will see where we get to with that," said Club England managing director Adrian Bevington.
"Everyone is aware of our feelings on the importance of wearing the poppy.
"We wrote to Fifa three weeks ago now, setting out our request. We were advised by them that for various technical reasons around what you can wear on the shirt, they were declining our request.
"They have granted us the minute's silence before the game against Spain. We are wearing poppies at training on Friday and are also having a two minutes' silence.
"In addition, we will also have the armed forces on the pitch at the start of the game on Saturday and 500 servicemen and women in the stands, which is our continued standard contribution to the armed services."
