U.S. Soccer requires participants to stand for national anthem

The United States Soccer Federation has made a new policy that requires all of the participants on the national soccer team to stand during the National Anthem.

The United States Soccer Federation recently created a rule that will be followed by all the participants of the international soccer team. All players must now stand for the national anthem when it is played at the beginning of the game.

This new rule comes in the wake of the recent controversial actions by athletes to not stand during the national anthem.

The USSF did not want to be a part of those actions, so they decided to require all players to now stand for the anthem when it is played before the games, as reported by FOX Soccer’s Stuart Holden:

Colin Kaepernick, the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback, was the main athlete that started the movement of not standing and it has grabbed the attention of everyone, even athletes outside of the NFL. Kaepernick started to kneel during the anthem in the preseason and continued to do it all the way till the end of the 49ers season. As the season went on, other NFL players started to do it and then many other major league athletes picked up on it.

The reasoning that Kaepernick started kneeling during the anthem was because he felt as if the country was no longer representing all of its citizens anymore. So, Kaepernick decided to, for lack of a better phrase, “take a stand” by not standing during the anthem.

The USSF did not want their players to be taking part in the act, so they made this new rule to prevent their players from not standing.

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Holden also reported that there is no current consequence if the players do not stand during the anthem. One will probably be determined if the USSF has to cross that bridge.