FA deny Israel complaint

FIFA declared that top scorer Roberto Colautti and young striker Toto Tamuz (pictured) - Argentina and Nigeria-born respectively - would not be able to play again for England's Euro 2008 Group E rivals until they obtain full citizenship, leading to criticism from Israel's FA and speculation that England had exerted pressure on world football's governing body to aid them in the crucial clash between the two at Wembley on September 8th.

"The FA had absolutely no involvement in this issue," an FA spokesman told eurosport.yahoo.co.uk. "No-one knew anything about it."

"The first we heard about this issue was when we read about it in the newspapers today," he continued. "Until then we were not aware of the issue."

After an initial storm, the Israelis are remaining calm on the matter, with IFA chairman Avi Luzon telling Eurosport.yahoo.co.uk that they expect to resolve the issue.

"There are two ways to do this - one through getting our lawyers to deal with FIFA and the other with our government," Luzon said.

"Firstly, FIFA cannot do this now because we already agreed with them that the two players could play the whole tournament.

"Secondly, we will talk with the government to get passports for each of the players.

"We believe they will be okay to play against England in September."

Luzon also laughed off reports that IFA were blaming underhand tactics from England for FIFA's invocation of the ruling.

"We don't know if England had anything to do with it - this is just speculation, thoughts from people," he continued.

"Nobody can say if they know this, it is just rumours."

Luzon also added that FIFA's ruling would not affect the rights of Israeli Arabs or Palestinians living in Israel to play for the country, saying that as long as they were Israeli passport holders they would be considered for selection.

- REDA MAHER AND MATAN KRAKOW -