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maltatoday SUNDAY 12 NOVEMBER 2017 55 FOOTBALL Sports Hope Solo accuses Sepp Blatter of sexual harassment five years ago US soccer star Hope Solo ac- cused ex-FIFA President Sepp Blatter of grabbing her buttocks during an awards ceremony five years ago, an allegation that the former head of international football's governing body denied. Solo, 36, told a Portuguese newspaper that Blatter touched her inappropriately in Janu- ary 2013 during the Ballon D'or awards ceremony in Lisbon. A spokeswoman for Solo on Satur- day confirmed her comments. "I had Sepp Blatter grab my ass," the former goalkeeper on the US national women's team said in an audio interview with Expresso, posted on Saturday. "It was at the Ballon D'or one year, right before I went on stage," said Solo, who received FIFA's women's player of the year award in 2013. "It's been normal- ised." A spokesman for Blatter said in a phone interview on Saturday that Solo's allegation was "absurd and ridiculous, and it is not true." Solo is the latest celebrity to go public with accusations of sexual misconduct by powerful men in sports and entertainment, in- cluding movie producer Harvey Weinstein, actor Kevin Spacey and former Fox News host Bill O'Reilly. The high-profile allegations have inspired an online cam- paign, tagged #MeToo, that has encouraged men and women in all walks of life to reveal their own experiences with sexual harassment and assault, often years after they occurred. Solo last month posted a state- ment on her Instagram page that commended women in the en- tertainment industry for having courage to reveal their experi- ences with sexual misconduct and suggested she had been a victim herself. "From inappropriate com- ments, unwanted advances and grabs of the ass to coaches and GMs and even press officers speaking about players 'tits' and physical appearance, sexual harassment is rampant in the sports world," Solo wrote on- line. "I always felt I'd 'handled it' and stood up for myself in those situations, but there were never any consequences for the per- petrators," she added. Solo, considered one of the best goalkeepers in the world, played on the US women's soc- cer team from 2000 to 2016, when it won two Olympic gold medals and a World Cup. Blatter is in the midst of a six- year ban from all soccer-related duties imposed by Zurich- based FIFA's ethics committee after a corruption scandal. Hope Solo and Sepp Blatter presented an award together in 2013 Goalless draw enough to secure Tunisia World Cup berth TUNISIA booked their place in next year's World Cup finals after securing a point from a goalless draw at home against neighbours Libya yesterday. Tunisia finished on 14 points in Group A of the African preliminaries, one ahead of the Democratic Republic of Congo, that fell short despite a 3-1 win over Guinea in Kinshasa at the same time. Unbeaten Tunisia, who have been to four previous World Cup finals and were the first African country to win a game at the finals in 1978, were denied a fifth win in six group matches as Libya's goalkeeper Mohamed Nashnush made a number of key saves. Diving saves kept Youssef Msakni, An- ice Badri and Ghilane Chaalani from scoring as Nashnush proved a one-man roadblock. Tunisia threw everything into attack- ing in the closing stages to try and force a win in front of their home fans. Libya avoided last place in the group with the draw as they advanced to four points with Guinea staying on three. Libya had been forced to play all of their home games at neutral venues, in- cluding Tunisia, because of a FIFA ban on internationals in the country, where the security situation is judged unsafe for visiting teams. Tunisia's fans