Aug 1 (Reuters) – UEFA said it had lost confidence in FIFA President Gianni Infantino on Saturday after world soccer’s governing body abandoned plans to sell a stake in the commercial rights to the World Cup.
FIFA’s proposal had triggered a fierce backlash from regional confederations who said they had been blindsided by Infantino’s plans to raise up to $4.2 billion by selling about a 20% stake to private investors in a new unit that would run FIFA events, including the World Cup.
The swift reversal has exposed growing unease within world soccer over Infantino’s leadership style, with football officials demanding greater oversight of decisions that could reshape the governance and commercial future of the sport.
UEFA, whose 55 members had unanimously rejected the proposal earlier this week, declared FIFA’s retreat a “victory for the whole game” while adding that the “task of rebuilding trust in FIFA” had only just begun.
“The current FIFA leadership has not only lost UEFA’s confidence but also that of many other members of the football family,” UEFA said in a statement.
“UEFA thanks all the fans, leagues, clubs, players, individuals, associations and confederations that opposed the scheme, alongside the many Prime Ministers, Heads of State and commentators who have demonstrated to the FIFA President that football is not for sale,” it said in a statement.
“We cannot keep going on like this with secret schemes on fast-track timescales, cooked up by faceless individuals and of dubious benefit to the game. We must identify those responsible and hold them to account.”
“SHABBY, BACK-ROOM OPAQUE DEAL”
The backlash raised questions about Infantino’s political capital as he prepares to seek another term in office.
UEFA reminded Infantino about the promises he made when he was elected FIFA president in 2016 — vowing to work with transparency and saying FIFA’s money belonged to the national associations.
“On both these promises, he has failed to deliver. The shabby, back-room, opaque deal he hatched and tried to force through was anything but transparent,” UEFA added.
“And with reserves standing at over $5 billion, he has also failed to use associations’ money for the benefit of the game.
“UEFA will begin work immediately with partners and stakeholders all over the world and right across the game to propose a new way of distributing resources through the existing FIFA Forward programme.”
FIFA and Infantino declined to comment on UEFA’s statement.
Infantino’s plan, announced on Tuesday, quickly ran into a storm of opposition from regional confederations, who complained they had not been consulted on a move that could alter the commercial structure of world football.
Following the backlash, Infantino said world soccer’s governing body had abandoned the plans after listening “carefully to all the views”.
Asian Football Confederation President Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al-Khalifa on Saturday welcomed FIFA’s reversal.
Bahrain’s Sheikh Salman said he expected that “any initiative that has the potential to impact global football will be presented and discussed with the Confederations, the FIFA Council, Member Associations and other stakeholders in a timely, transparent and meaningful manner.”
“The future of global football must always be shaped through proper consultation, collective dialogue and respect for the established governance structures of our game.”
Football Australia chairman Anter Isaac struck a similar note, backing innovation while warning against bypassing core governance principles.
“Football has never stood still, nor should it,” Isaac said.
“Some principles, however, should never change. Integrity. Independence. Good governance. Transparency. Meaningful consultation. Due process.”
“These are not constraints on progress. They are what make lasting progress possible.”
INFANTINO’S RE-ELECTION HOPES DAMAGED, SAY EXPERTS
The controversy comes at an awkward moment for Infantino, who said in April he intends to seek re-election for a fourth term as FIFA president.
Since taking over from Sepp Blatter in 2016, he has been re-elected unopposed twice and appeared firmly in control of the organisation.
While his re-election for the 2027-31 term had appeared a formality, experts told Reuters the backlash against the failed proposal had exposed dissatisfaction among some FIFA members and could complicate his path ahead of next March’s FIFA Congress in Morocco.
“He’s obviously been kind of egomaniacal in everything that he’s done. I know that he’s rubbed many of the member associations the wrong way with some of his decisions,” Bob Dorfman, a sports marketing analyst, said.
“Some of the countries that have been awarded World Cups have been kind of questionable. Politics has gotten involved in this a little too much.”
The speed of the turnaround has been particularly striking, coming less than two weeks after Infantino was toasting the most commercially successful World Cup in history.
“It’s hard to think of a situation where a person’s political fortunes changed so rapidly,” said economist Victor Matheson, a sports business expert at the College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts.
“As close as two weeks ago, he’s riding, you know, on top of the world, the most successful sports mega event in the history of this planet. And just two weeks later, he’s fighting for his political life.”
(Reporting by Kokkai Ng in Singapore, Aadi Nair and Rohith Nair in Bengaluru; Editing by Tom Hogue, Shri Navaratnam and Clare Fallon)
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