The Telephone Appeal.

Every age insists it has discovered a new relationship between politics and sport. Rome had its chariot races, Victorian Britain its imperial cricket, and the twentieth century perfected Olympic diplomacy. The twenty-first appears content with presidential phone calls.

Donald Trump's intervention over Folarin Balogun's World Cup red card may prove to be remembered less as a football controversy than as another reminder that institutions rarely enjoy complete independence once political power notices them.

The facts are straightforward enough. Balogun was shown a red card after a VAR review against Bosnia and Herzegovina, bringing with it the expected one-match suspension. Trump later confirmed that he telephoned FIFA President Gianni Infantino to argue the dismissal had been wrong. Shortly afterwards, FIFA suspended the ban, allowing Balogun to play against Belgium.

Whether the tackle deserved a red card is now almost irrelevant. Football has argued over referees since the game acquired referees. The more interesting question is why a governing body that has spent decades insisting on its political neutrality should find itself defending a decision that arrived so soon after a call from the White House.

UEFA described the decision as crossing "a red line." Belgium questioned both the process and the player's eligibility. FIFA, for its part, maintained that its disciplinary committee had acted independently and within its regulations. Perhaps it did.

Kafka imagined institutions whose decisions could not quite be explained. FIFA has managed something rather more contemporary: a decision everyone can explain, but nobody quite believes.

None of this is entirely new. Sport has always attracted politicians. Governments have hosted Olympic Games to announce their arrival, boycotted them to register displeasure and celebrated victories as evidence of national character. Football has generally preferred to pretend it occupied a separate universe. It was a comforting fiction while it lasted.

Presidents have always sought proximity to popular institutions. FIFA's difficulty is not that Trump called. It is that FIFA looked pleased to have been called, and answered in a way that invited everyone else to wonder whether the rule book now comes with a list of preferred contacts.

Ironically, the intervention achieved remarkably little. Belgium beat the United States 4-1 regardless. Results have a habit of restoring perspective that administrators struggle to manufacture.

The precedent, however, is harder to dismiss.

Every controversial suspension now carries an obvious question. If one decision can be reconsidered after a conversation between presidents, why not another? The next federation, government or influential figure would be negligent not to wonder whether persuasion has become another part of the appeals process.

Football has survived disputed penalties, phantom goals and referees whose eyesight appeared to deteriorate at precisely the wrong moment. What it has always depended upon is the assumption that, eventually, the laws apply equally to everyone.

The details change. The script rarely does.

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The views expressed are those of the correspondent. Factual claims draw on publicly available sources.