DUBAI — The United Arab Emirates Football Association has demanded an apology after a story on the Asian Football Confederation website referred to its national side as the “Sand Monkeys.”



General Secretary Yousuf Abdulla Sunday called the wording in Friday’s 2015 Asian Cup profile an “unfortunate affair” which “revealed some racist acts by some AFC officials.” “We express our strong resentment over the use of this bad description by the AFC website,” in a match report, Abdullah said in a statement.



“What happened is unacceptable and shows disrespect to others. It is a proof of racist attitudes that are starting to surface,” he said, demanding “a quick official apology.”



An AFC spokesman said the wording was immediately removed once editors were made aware of it. He called it a “genuine mistake” inserted by a new website writer who had seen “Sand Monkeys” wrongly listed as the team’s nickname on its Wikipedia page. The team’s actual nickname is Al-Abyad, or The White, based on the color of their outfit.



A review of the UAE page shows that the phrase was put up last month but removed Saturday.



Lampard, Bertrand ruled out of Poland clash



England suffered a double blow ahead of Tuesday’s World Cup qualifier against Poland after Chelsea duo Frank Lampard and Ryan Bertrand were ruled out of the trip to Warsaw.



Lampard, who has a knee injury, and Bertrand, sidelined by a throat infection, missed Friday’s 5-0 victory over San Marino.



After reporting to England’s training camp on Sunday to be assessed by the medical team, it was decided that neither would be able to take part. — Agencies