lol, FIFA

[Lineker]

Trinidad and Tobago’s attorney general says he has received a US request for the extradition of former Fifa vice-president Jack Warner on corruption charges.

Garvin Nicholas said that his office will evaluate the documents from the US justice department to decide whether to take the extradition matter before a magistrate.

Warner is scheduled to appear before a court on 27 July. He is resisting extradition on US charges of racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering in the Fifa corruption case. He is out on bail.

Trinidad legal experts believe Warner’s extradition could take five years to resolve.

US prosecutors allege South Africa funnelled $10m in 2008 to Warner and two other Fifa executives as payment for them supporting its successful bid to host the 2010 World Cup.

[Lineker]

‘Proud’ Jérôme Valcke to leave Fifa in February with Sepp Blatter

Visa head attacks Sepp Blatter and Fifa’s ‘wholly inadequate’ crisis response

Sepp Blatter offered job placement at Radio Yorkshire after Fifa presidency

 

[Lineker]

Michel Platini is set to declare he will run for the Fifa presidency this week and an announcement could come as early as Wednesday.

Platini, the Uefa president, held talks with football powerbrokers at the 2018 World Cup draw in St Petersburg at the weekend and is now confident he has the support necessary to win.

It is understood a letter to national associations declaring his intentions has already been prepared ready to send out when he announces his candidacy.

The election to succeed Sepp Blatter will take place on 26 February in Zurich.

[Lineker]

Michel Platini has announced he will run to replace Sepp Blatter as the Fifa president in next February’s election.

Platini, the Uefa president, held talks with football powerbrokers at the 2018 World Cup draw in St Petersburg last weekend and is now confident he has the support necessary to win.

“This was a very personal, carefully considered decision, one in which I weighed up the future of football alongside my own future. I was also guided by the esteem, support and encouragement that many of you have shown me,” Platini said in a statement, having written to all 209 member associations of Fifa to inform them of his intentions to stand.

“There are times in life when you have to take your destiny into your own hands. I am at one of those decisive moments, at a juncture in my life and in events that are shaping the future of Fifa.”

The election to succeed Blatter will take place on 26 February in Zurich. The 60-year-old Platini is the favourite to succeed the Swiss after gaining the backing of four of the six Fifa confederations, including the powerful Asia bloc. The Football Association is expected to back him along with most, if not all, countries in Europe.

Platini has publicly stated he voted for Qatar to host the 2022 World Cup, and although the award of that tournament to the Gulf state has caused huge controversy, in Fifa terms his backing for Qatar is likely to be an advantage.

Platini has been the Uefa president since 2007 and was a supporter of Blatter in the past, but fell out with him when the 79-year-old backtracked on his 2011 promise to step down at the end of his fourth term in office.

Blatter was re-elected in May, but within four days had announced he would quit after Fifa’s involvement in payments to officials was uncovered. All nominations for the election have to be submitted by 26 October.

[Dan]

Even worse than Blatter. Great.

[The Lusophone]

Platini is in no way worse than Blatter.

[Lineker]

The former Fifa presidential candidate, Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan has described Michel Platini’s decision to stand for the post in February’s election as “not good for Fifa”.

Platini, the Uefa president, announced earlier on Wednesday that he intended to stand in the election to choose a replacement for Sepp Blatter.

“Platini is not good for Fifa,” said Prince Ali, who also lost his place on Fifa’s executive committee in May in a statement. “Football’s fans and players deserve better. Fifa is engulfed in scandal. We must stop doing business as usual. The practice of back-room, under-the-table deals must end.”

Prince Ali, who is yet to announce whether he intends to run again, said he would be consulting individual football federations in the coming week “about what is in the best interests of football”.

“What is clear is that Fifa needs new, independent leadership, untainted by the practices of the past,” he declared.

The Jordanian withdrew from the previous election on 29 May after receiving 73 votes to Blatter’s 133 in the first round of voting.

However, Blatter, in a shock announcement four days later, said he would lay down his mandate as Fifa was engulfed by a bribery scandal being investigated by US, Swiss and other law enforcement agencies.

The Dutch football federation, whose president, Michael van Praag, withdrew from the May presidential race one week before the election, said Platini was a “serious candidate” to replace the Swiss.

“There is a real chance of more candidates putting themselves forward,” the federation added. “Only when these names are known will the board take a decision about its stance in the 26 February elections.”

The deadline for candidates to formally present their nominations, with support, is 26 October. They will also have to undergo integrity checks, led by Domenico Scala, head of the ad-hoc election committee.

[Lineker]

America’s national museum of organized crime is opening a Fifa exhibit in September.

The Mob Museum in downtown Las Vegas announced on Monday the opening of The ‘Beautiful Game’ Turns Ugly, a permanent display on world soccer’s governing body and the corruption scandal that’s engulfed it.

“This exhibit is ripped right from today’s headlines about the globe’s most popular sport,” Jonathan Ullman, the museum’s executive director said in a statement. “To our growing number of visitors from places like the United Kingdom, Mexico, Brazil and Italy, the Fifa scandal provides an especially resonant example of the different shapes organized crime can take.”

The exhibit, opening 1 September, will examine the “kickbacks, secrecy and match-fixing” associated with Fifa “through photographs, media clippings and cover stories and expository narrative.”

In May, Swiss authorities on behalf of the US Department of Justice arrested 14 officials, nine of whom were current or former Fifa executives, on charges including racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering conspiracy in a dramatic early-morning raid in Zurich.

The Mob Museum, officially known the National Museum of Organized Crime and Law Enforcement, has attracted more than 800,000 visitors since opening in 2012.

[Lineker]

Chung Mong-joon, one of the most influential figures in Asian football, announced on Thursday that he is entering the race to replace Sepp Blatter as president of Fifa.

A former Fifa vice-president, the South Korean Chung said in an interview he would make his formal announcement next month in Europe, “the centre of world football”. He said he wanted to be part of the solution to clean up the corruption-tainted governing body.

“I am going to stand as a candidate for the Fifa presidency,” he said, acknowledging he had a tough fight ahead of him. “It’s not easy but people don’t want to be part of corruption. They want to be part of the solution. We cannot leave Fifa in this kind of disgrace.”

Chung said he did not yet have the required backing of five Fifa federations that would allow him to stand but he was confident of getting that required support.

“I hope to have more than five nominations,” he said, adding he had received assurances of support from within Concacaf on a recent trip to the United States.

“If I get elected,” he told the BBC, “my job is not to enjoy the luxury of the office. My job is to change it … it is time that Fifa had a non-European leadership. Fifa became a closed organisation for President Blatter, his associates and his cronies and I want to change that.”

On Wednesday, Michel Platini announced he will also run to replace Blatter as the Fifa president in next February’s election but Chung believes that Platini is not the man to bring about the change needed. “Mr Platini enjoys institutional support from the current structure of Fifa. Mr Platini is very much a product of the current system.”

The FA has said that it will offer its backing to the Frenchman but added that Fifa must be “fundamentally changed” in the aftermath of the recent corruption scandal that has rocked football’s world governing body.

Meanwhile, Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim al-Khalifa, the president of the Asian Football Confederation, has called for the region to unify behind one candidate in the presidential election and stopped short of endorsing Platini for the job.

“We have of course noted Michel Platini’s decision to stand,” Khalifa said in a statement released before Chung announced his candidacy. “He is certainly a unique candidate who would bring stability and a smooth transition to normality for Fifa in this difficult situation.”

“Yet we should also remember that the Fifa president is only one part of Fifa, which is why it is so important to get the reforms right as well. Everybody accepts the need for change in Fifa, and in addition to changing the president much of the rest of Fifa’s organisation and the way it functions need to be modernised as well. Fifa also needs someone who can take the best of the past, fuse it with new ideas, and so take the organisation into the future.”

The Jordanian Prince Ali bin al-Hussein, who lost to Blatter in the first round of last May’s presidential ballot before withdrawing, said on Wednesday that Platini’s candidature would not be good for Fifa.

Prince Ali, who is yet to announce whether he intends to run again, said the world governing body needed new, independent leadership “untainted by the practices of the past” in order for proper reform to take place.

The AFC statement echoed his call for a “new Fifa and a new Fifa president”, even if the fact that Prince Ali did not have the backing of his home confederation when he took on Blatter last year indicates that Asia is unlikely to vote as a bloc.

“Fifa is in a very difficult position right now. In order to stabilise it needs leadership, experience and new ideas, but above all it needs football to be placed at its heart,” Khalifa added. “Hopefully a new president can bring many of these things, which is why it is so important for Asia to remain as united as possible behind the single best candidate for football, regardless of where they are from.”

[Lineker]

Fifa has confirmed the former Olympic official François Carrard will chair a task force overseeing reforms of football’s governing body in the wake of corruption scandals.

Carrard, a Swiss lawyer, served as director general of the International Olympic Committee for 14 years until 2003, a period which included the Salt Lake City bidding scandal.

Carrard will lead a team of 12 officials picked by Fifa’s six continental confederations, including the new Fifa executive committee member Sheik Ahmad al-Fahad al-Sabah of Kuwait. World Cup sponsors will also nominate two members to the panel.

The Fifa president, Sepp Blatter, promised “deep-rooted structural change” when he announced his resignation plans in June.

Reform proposals affecting the Fifa president and executive committee include term limits, publishing their salary and stricter vetting of candidates.

[Benji]

So, was looking for his Wiki page when I instead got Fatso the Fat-Arsed Wombat. Never change, Australia.

[Schlitzbrille]

Are there any half-decent FIFA officials who we can trade Roger Gooddell in exchange for?

[Lineker]

Nope.

[Lineker]

 

[Lineker]

Crisis hit Fifa has moved to distance itself from controversial comments by the man charged with overseeing its reform after he appeared to clear president Sepp Blatter of any wrongdoing and was derogatory about football in the United States.

François Carrard, the Swiss lawyer appointed to lead Fifa’s reform commission, said Blatter had been unfairly treated and that corruption at world football’s crisis hit governing body involved only “a few rogues”.

The former director general of the International Olympic Committee also sparked outrage in the United States when told Swiss newspaper Le Matin that football in the country was “just an ethnic sport for girls in schools”.

Desperately trying to undo the damage threatened to its supposed reform process before it has even got underway, amid ongoing calls for a truly independent root and branch overhaul, Fifa said on Thursday night that Carrard’s comments were made in a personal capacity.

“Any comments by individuals associated with Fifa with respect to the ongoing investigations and the state of US football should be seen as personal views and do not reflect the views or position of Fifa,” said a spokeswoman.

“Fifa is committed to reform and sees the investigations as key elements to ensure a successful process. Fifa is cooperating with the authorities in this matter.”

US and Swiss authorities are continuing to investigate suspicious transactions related to the awarding of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups. In May, Fifa was plunged into crisis by a US indictment alleging a “World Cup of fraud”.

Fifa also tried to mend bridges with the US in the wake of Carrard’s careless comments.

“The growth of football and the increased participation levels in the US have been tremendous and demonstrate the nation’s passion for the game,” it said.

“Fifa continues to work tirelessly to support the global development of the game in partnership with all of our 209 member associations.”

[Lineker]

Michel Platini refused to talk about his campaign to replace Sepp Blatter as Fifa president in his first press conference since he declared his candidacy in July, although he slipped in remarks which could be viewed as veiled swipes at Blatter, his former ally.

Asked why under his presidency Uefa has not been rocked by corruption scandals on a scale similar to the crises besetting Fifa, Platini smiled and said: “All thanks to the president.”

Insisting he would not discuss Fifa because he was on duty as Uefa president in Monaco at the draws for this season’s Champions League and Europa League, Platini said of Uefa’s anti-corruption and financial governance rules:

“The president fully complies with all the mechanisms put in place by Uefa. People are the key. People ensure that the rules work, rather than rules governing people’s behaviour.”

Platini declared on 29 July he will run for election as Fifa president after Blatter announced he will step down following the years of corruption scandals which culminated in the arrest of 14 people on US corruption charges in May. Platini smiled again when he said that means he will either cease to be the Uefa president either in six months or three years when his term ends – indicating that he may support a strict limit on how many terms a president can serve. He and Blatter, his one-time mentor, fell out when Blatter reversed his promise to step down this year at the end of his fourth term in office, and instead stood for re-election.

Sources in Monaco close to Platini said he remains confident he will have sufficient backing to win the Fifa election, having held talks with key leaders of the Asian Football Confederation before he declared his candidacy. Chung Mong-joon, the South Korean honorary Fifa vice-president, whose family controls Hyundai, has announced he will stand but Platini’s declaration followed talks with the AFC president, Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim al-Khalifa, and with Kuwait’s Fifa executive committee member Sheikh Ahmad al-Fahad al-Sabah, who is seen as a key power-broker in Asia. Platini is said to have been convinced he will have the support of sufficient AFC countries’ federations and those in South America, together with the European associations, before he declared he will stand.

Uefa’s general-secretary, Gianni Infantino, who will sit on the Fifa reform task force, which meets for the first time next week, emphasised the need for financial transparency at the scandal-hit organisation. Pointing to figures showing that since the introduction of Uefa’s financial fair play rules Europe’s top clubs have reduced their overall losses from a €1.7bn (£1.2bn) peak in 2011 to €487m (£354m), Infantino said: “We have restored financial sanity.”

Platini rejected the complaint being increasingly voiced across European football that the Premier League’s financial might is making English clubs too dominant in the transfer market. Instead Platini praised the strength of English football, and its supporters, and said success has always depended on money and large and small countries are naturally unequal.

[Lineker]

Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan is set to announce as early as Wednesday that he will stand in the upcoming Fifa presidential election.

Ali, 39, pushed incumbent president Sepp Blatter to a second round of voting in May's poll, winning 73 votes, before standing aside in the contest.

He will join Uefa president Michel Platini in declaring an interest in leading football's governing body.

The election is due to be held on 26 February next year.

Blatter, 79, triggered the election by announcing shortly after winning the last vote that he would resign, amid twin criminal investigations into alleged corruption at Fifa.

Seven Fifa officials were arrested in May on charges of racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering.

Former Fifa executive Chung Mong-joon of South Korea has also indicated that he will run in next year's election, as has Liberian FA president Musa Bility.

[Lineker]

Fifa secretary Jerome Valcke suspended

[The Lusophone]

A shame, he always came across as competent and as potentially someone who might've been above board.

Shouldn't be an internal ethics committee dealing with this though, should be an outside body.

[MDK]

I'm currently reading a book about the Qatari bid for the World Cup. There is SO much dodgyness.