Video of a football match stopped during Azaan (call for prayer in Islam) is being shared on social media claiming that the incident happened at FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022. Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Claim: Video of a football match stopped during Azaan at FIFA World cup Qatar 2022.
Fact: This video shows a match between Al Fayha(or Feiha) and Al Fateh teams in Saudi King’s Cup 2018 at King Salman Sport City Stadium, Saudi Arabia on 24 January 2018. Former Premier League referee Mark Clattenburg stopped the match for a while out of respect for the Muslim call to prayer from nearby mosque. The FIFA World cup 2022 is taking place in Qatar from 20 November to 18 December of 2022. Hence the claim made in the post is MISLEADING.
We searched the internet with relevant keywords and found that the same video was posted on Twitter on 24 January 2018. The title says that the match between Al Fayha (or Feiha) and Al Fateh teams was stopped in respect of Maghrib prayer call.
Taking a cue from this, we searched further about this incident and came across a BBC report published on 25 January 2018.
According to the report, former Premier League referee Mark Clattenburg stopped a Saudi Arabia cup match apparently out of respect for the Muslim call to prayer. He was officiating a match in Saudi Arabia between Al Feiha and Al-Fateh on Wednesday when the Adhan (or Azaan) sounded around the King Salman Sport City Stadium from nearby mosques. As per the match report, the match is a part of the tournament called “Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Cup – Saudi Arabia-2018” held between 03 January – 12 May of 2018 in Saudi Arabia. However, FIFA World cup 2022 is taking place in Qatar from 20 November to 18 December of 2022.
To sum it up, video of a football match stopped during Azaan in Saudi Arabian King cup, 2018 is falsely linked to FIFA World cup Qatar 2022..
