Fair play, to coin a phrase, to Greg Dyke, David Gill, Michel Platini and other of European football’s senior politicians for standing up to the global game’s tarnished boss, Sepp Blatter, and his bare-faced plan to stand for another four years as Fifa president.
Dyke, the Football Association chairman, tore into the breathtaking response to corruption allegations in which, as of old, Blatter blamed the English media for reporting them, this time telling African football associations the motivation was “racist”. Gill, never known as a boat-rocker in his many years as Manchester United chief executive, said Blatter should be honouring his 2011 promise to step down next year, and Gill denounced the swerving of the new corruption allegations as a “stain” on world football.
Platini, the Uefa president, said he was “proud” that the FA, president of the Dutch FA, Michael van Praag, and others had spoken out and told Blatter the alleged corruption of Fifa must end.
Yet now they have to show they mean it. That they really do want to see the end of the hideous corruption disfiguring a great sport, that they have the stomach for an actual fight, that they will work on a credible plan to overthrow Blatter and fumigate Fifa.
Alex Horne, the FA general secretary, was also unusually outspoken, saying the European associations are looking for a “credible” figure for the presidential election to challenge Blatter, who has resiled on his pledge that this would be his last term. Yet Platini, the obvious candidate, a footballing great whose integrity is still roughly respected despite his vote for Qatar to host the 2022 World Cup, is considered unlikely to stand.
He has looked at the prospect, of taking on a man whose power has been entrenched by the corrupt, unaccountable system itself, and balked. Platini is believed reluctant to take on a thankless, lonely job, most likely facing defeat to loyalists throughout Africa, South America and other strongholds well served by the Blatter regime over the years. The fight would surely not be pleasant, either, with Blatter, even at 78, fixed obsessively on maintaining his power for four more years.
Platini is said to believe he would do better staying at Uefa and continuing work which can at least achieve something, rather than take on a probable losing battle with Blatter. We have had a dry run of this moment before, back at the Fifa congress of 2011 after Blatter’s then challenger, Mohamed bin Hammam, had been suspended over the eerily well-timed exposé of the cash he paid to Caribbean football association delegates on whom he was impressing his credentials.
The then FA chairman David Bernstein made a lonely walk through glacial stares in Zurich, to argue the election should be postponed, rather than proceed to the farce of voting with a single name left on the ballot paper. There was a similar furore then over corruption allegations against senior Fifa executive committee members: Bin Hammam and Jack Warner; Nicolás Leoz, Ricardo Teixeira and the former president João Havelange, who were later proven to have taken massive bribes from the marketing company ISL, with the direct knowledge of Blatter himself, then Havelange’s faithful general-secretary.
Yet the probable fate of a “clean-up” rival put up by the European associations is signalled by Bernstein’s stand three years ago. His speech was met in icy silence, then followed by frothing anti-England speeches by delegates, including Ángel María Villar Llona of Spain and Julio Grondona of Argentina, and a sycophantic paean of praise for Blatter from Moucharafou Anjorin, the Benin FA president. Only 15 of the 203 football associations in that hall voted for Bernstein’s proposal. Then 186 dutifully filed into booths and put a cross against Blatter’s name to re-elect him.
There was some disquiet voiced by sponsors then, too, which came to little. Hopes for Fifa reform are not best invested in multinational corporations who burnish the image of their mostly unhealthy products by intimate association with the glamorous athleticism of football.
Fifa, overseen by Blatter since he won his first election in 1998 with the fixing help of Bin Hammam, needs to be cleaned out. The internal investigation, only into the award of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, by Michael Garcia, chairman of the “ethics committee” – an irony-free title – is a fig leaf. Blatter appears to believe that will abate the critics and enable him to sail on, captain of his Fifa ship, for four more years, his loyal international crew behind him.
If the European associations are serious, they must consider using the muscle they have, as the wealthiest continent driving much of the World Cup’s $4bn (£2.4bn) sponsorship and TV rights value, even to threaten a breakaway or boycott. Having made this stand, they should not come back from the frenzy of Brazil to their more comfortable lives, and give it up as too much trouble.
Dyke, the Football Association chairman, tore into the breathtaking response to corruption allegations in which, as of old, Blatter blamed the English media for reporting them, this time telling African football associations the motivation was “racist”. Gill, never known as a boat-rocker in his many years as Manchester United chief executive, said Blatter should be honouring his 2011 promise to step down next year, and Gill denounced the swerving of the new corruption allegations as a “stain” on world football.
Platini, the Uefa president, said he was “proud” that the FA, president of the Dutch FA, Michael van Praag, and others had spoken out and told Blatter the alleged corruption of Fifa must end.
Yet now they have to show they mean it. That they really do want to see the end of the hideous corruption disfiguring a great sport, that they have the stomach for an actual fight, that they will work on a credible plan to overthrow Blatter and fumigate Fifa.
Alex Horne, the FA general secretary, was also unusually outspoken, saying the European associations are looking for a “credible” figure for the presidential election to challenge Blatter, who has resiled on his pledge that this would be his last term. Yet Platini, the obvious candidate, a footballing great whose integrity is still roughly respected despite his vote for Qatar to host the 2022 World Cup, is considered unlikely to stand.
He has looked at the prospect, of taking on a man whose power has been entrenched by the corrupt, unaccountable system itself, and balked. Platini is believed reluctant to take on a thankless, lonely job, most likely facing defeat to loyalists throughout Africa, South America and other strongholds well served by the Blatter regime over the years. The fight would surely not be pleasant, either, with Blatter, even at 78, fixed obsessively on maintaining his power for four more years.
Platini is said to believe he would do better staying at Uefa and continuing work which can at least achieve something, rather than take on a probable losing battle with Blatter. We have had a dry run of this moment before, back at the Fifa congress of 2011 after Blatter’s then challenger, Mohamed bin Hammam, had been suspended over the eerily well-timed exposé of the cash he paid to Caribbean football association delegates on whom he was impressing his credentials.
The then FA chairman David Bernstein made a lonely walk through glacial stares in Zurich, to argue the election should be postponed, rather than proceed to the farce of voting with a single name left on the ballot paper. There was a similar furore then over corruption allegations against senior Fifa executive committee members: Bin Hammam and Jack Warner; Nicolás Leoz, Ricardo Teixeira and the former president João Havelange, who were later proven to have taken massive bribes from the marketing company ISL, with the direct knowledge of Blatter himself, then Havelange’s faithful general-secretary.
Yet the probable fate of a “clean-up” rival put up by the European associations is signalled by Bernstein’s stand three years ago. His speech was met in icy silence, then followed by frothing anti-England speeches by delegates, including Ángel María Villar Llona of Spain and Julio Grondona of Argentina, and a sycophantic paean of praise for Blatter from Moucharafou Anjorin, the Benin FA president. Only 15 of the 203 football associations in that hall voted for Bernstein’s proposal. Then 186 dutifully filed into booths and put a cross against Blatter’s name to re-elect him.
There was some disquiet voiced by sponsors then, too, which came to little. Hopes for Fifa reform are not best invested in multinational corporations who burnish the image of their mostly unhealthy products by intimate association with the glamorous athleticism of football.
Fifa, overseen by Blatter since he won his first election in 1998 with the fixing help of Bin Hammam, needs to be cleaned out. The internal investigation, only into the award of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, by Michael Garcia, chairman of the “ethics committee” – an irony-free title – is a fig leaf. Blatter appears to believe that will abate the critics and enable him to sail on, captain of his Fifa ship, for four more years, his loyal international crew behind him.
If the European associations are serious, they must consider using the muscle they have, as the wealthiest continent driving much of the World Cup’s $4bn (£2.4bn) sponsorship and TV rights value, even to threaten a breakaway or boycott. Having made this stand, they should not come back from the frenzy of Brazil to their more comfortable lives, and give it up as too much trouble.
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