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One of America’s leading soccer reporters, who made headlines when he was detained at the Qatar World Cup for wearing a rainbow shirt, died Friday while covering the quarterfinals in Doha, according to his wife and the US Soccer federation.
Grant Wahl, 48, helped build soccer’s popularity in the United States through decades of vivid reporting at Sports Illustrated, then with CBS Sports.
According to NPR, Wahl collapsed in the press tribune as Friday’s Argentina-Netherlands match was winding down. Paramedics performed CPR at the scene before taking him away on a stretcher. The Wall Street Journal said Wahl apparently suffered a heart attack.
“Grant made soccer his life’s work, and we are devastated that he and his brilliant writing will no longer be with us,” US Soccer said in a statement.
It said the “entire US Soccer family is heartbroken.”
Wahl’s wife Celine Gounder, a renowned epidemiologist and expert on infectious diseases, tweeted: “I’m in complete shock.
