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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

Sports fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about sports. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

1,766 published reviews in this topic

FACTLYSports

Visuals of a woman flashing at FIFA world cup 2022 held in Qatar

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The post identified in the review claimed that a video of a woman flashing in public showed an incident at the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar. It also claimed she was the first woman imprisoned in Qatar for breaking FIFA regulations. FACTLY checked the video's provenance and compared the England shirt visible in it with shirts from the two football tournaments. A reverse image search using frames taken from the viral video found the same video on the meme-sharing site 9GAG, posted on 16 July 2021. The review reports that the video was posted after England lost to Italy in the UEFA Euro 2020 final on 11 July 2021, and says its title, “At least this coming home,” satirized the English football slogan “It’s coming home.” The review also compared the England jersey in the video with jerseys from the Euro 2020 championship and the 2022 Qatar World Cup. It says the shirt matched the Euro context: that championship took place in June–July 2021, while the Qatar World Cup began on 20 November 2022. Together, the earlier online appearance and the jersey comparison support the conclusion that the video was from the 2021 Euro tournament, not the 2022 World Cup. The excerpt does not provide details about the separate claim of imprisonment beyond including it in the post’s wording.

dpa FaktencheckSports

Katar hat einem Flugzeug mit der deutschen Fußball-Nationalmannschaft an Bord wegen der Lackierung die Landung verweigert.

Publisher’s rating: Die Behauptung ist falsch. Tatsächlich ist die mit einer Sonderlackierung ausgestattete «Fanhansa»-Maschine bereits mehrfach ohne Probleme in der katarischen Hauptstadt Doha gelandet. Das bestätigte ein Lufthansa-Sprecher auf dpa-Nachfrage.

The claim concerned the Lufthansa aircraft painted with the «Fanhansa» and «Diversity Wins» messages, and alleged that Qatar turned it away because of its design while it was carrying Germany’s national football team. The review’s account distinguishes the team’s journey from the aircraft’s later movements: the team departed Frankfurt for Oman on 14 November 2022, then travelled onward to Doha on a different aircraft. The specially painted Airbus A330 continued as planned to Dubai after the team had left it in Oman. To check the allegation that the plane had been refused entry, the review cites flight-tracking data from Flightradar24 and a statement from Lufthansa. It reports that the aircraft, registration D-AIKQ, landed in Doha on 16, 18 and 19 November. A Lufthansa spokesperson told dpa that these landings occurred without problems. This evidence directly contradicts the claim that Qatar had barred the aircraft from landing because of its livery. The review also gives the reason the national team did not fly into Doha on that aircraft: the team used another plane operated by a regional airline, with the DFB citing sustainability and avoiding empty flights. That change of aircraft does not show that Qatar refused the «Fanhansa» plane permission to land; the reported subsequent Doha landings provide evidence to the contrary.

Fact Crescendo Sri LankaSports

FIFA 2022 ලෝක කුසලාන තරගාවලිය නැරඹීමට ප්‍රේක්ෂකයන් මත්පැන් ගෙන ආ අයුරු? (PHOTO)

Publisher’s rating: False

The post presented a photograph as showing football fans disguising beer to bring it into FIFA World Cup 2022 venues in Qatar. The review investigated that specific image and claim, rather than whether alcohol restrictions existed in Qatar generally. It reports that its search for international news coverage of fans bringing beer into stadiums in this way found no such report: “අපට එවැනි පුවතක් දැක ගන්නට නොලැබුණි.” The image itself contradicted the post’s description. The review says it examined the uniform insignia of an official in the photograph and identified it as belonging to Saudi Arabia’s General Customs Authority, not Qatar’s: “මෙය කාටාරයේ නොව, සවුදි අරාබියේ සාමාන්‍ය රේගු අධිකාරියේ ලාංඡනය බවයි.” It also reports using reverse-image search to trace the photograph to a 2015 Saudi customs seizure near the United Arab Emirates border. The image showed a man arrested with 48,000 Heineken cans packaged to look like Pepsi: “2015 වර්ෂයේදී එක්සත් අරාබි එමීර් රාජ්‍යයට මායිම්ව සිටි සෞදි රේගු බලධාරීන් විසින් පෙප්සි කෝලා ලෙස හඟවමින් ඇසුරුම් කර තිබූ Heineken ටින් 48,000ක් සමඟ මිනිසෙකු අත්අඩංගුවට ගත් අවස්ථාවේ ඡායාරූපයක්”. Thus, although the photograph showed beer disguised as Pepsi, it documented a Saudi customs incident—not spectators smuggling alcohol into a Qatar World Cup stadium. The review’s conclusion is that the image was misrepresented as a current World Cup scene: “මෙය FIFA 2022 ලෝක කුසලාන තරගාවලිය පැවැත්වෙන කටාර් හි වූ සිදුවීමක් නොවන බවයි.”