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Uefa has doubled down on its threat to boycott the World Cup despite Fifa abandoning a controversial plan to raise capital from investors, as European football’s governing body moves to keep the pressure on Fifa president Gianni Infantino.
Uefa, whose members include current World Cup holders Spain, issued its threat of a boycott last week, seeking binding assurances that Fifa “will never again open its governance or competitions to private ownership”.
“These conditions have not been met,” Uefa said on Thursday. “In addition, Uefa made it abundantly clear in its statement on Saturday that it has lost confidence in Gianni Infantino’s presidency. That position holds.”
Last weekend, Fifa abandoned its plan to raise about $4bn by selling a 20 per cent stake in a new commercial entity to investors, caving in to a global backlash that has extended from former players and politicians to Fifa’s own members and staff.
The uproar led to widespread calls for Infantino to resign but Fifa’s divisive president has shown no sign of doing so.
Following an emergency meeting of Fifa’s senior management on Wednesday in Morocco, Infantino said he had the support of Fifa’s management board. That included secretary-general Mattias Grafström, who had only days previously described Infantino’s commercialisation plan as “reproachable”.
“With the project withdrawn, it was agreed that Fifa will no longer tolerate any attacks on its integrity, good governance and due process and will take all necessary measures to protect and safeguard its name and reputation,” Infantino and Grafström wrote in a letter to Fifa council members after the meeting in Morocco.
Uefa said on Thursday: “Yesterday’s announcement that some people employed by the Fifa president (and whose careers depend on his favour) agree with him changes nothing.”
However, Infantino’s opponents could be in for a protracted battle to force him out.
Fifa’s president could face a vote of no confidence at an extraordinary meeting of its Congress, the governing body’s supreme legislative authority, if one-fifth of its 211 members request one.
However, a meeting could take up to three months to arrange from the time it is called, potentially giving Infantino time to rally support. Football associations including Qatar, Lebanon and Morocco have backed Infantino, underlining that he retains support among some members, which all have the same voting power.
Michael Payne, former marketing chief of the International Olympic Committee, says Uefa has to pull off a difficult balancing act.
Despite its financial and sporting heft — five of the previous six World Cup winners have come from Europe — Uefa must ensure it works collaboratively with other member associations, or risk opening itself up to allegations that ousting Infantino is “just a European plot”, Payne said.
Addressing the present crisis, the players’ union Fifpro on Thursday called for a “legally binding engagement with professional football’s stakeholders on decisions of major consequence” and “governance and structural reforms that make it impossible for any individual . . . to drive unilateral decisions”.
Even in the absence of an emergency meeting, Infantino is seeking a fourth term at Fifa’s general election in March next year. In the event that another candidate runs, Infantino would need a simple majority of Fifa’s 211 member associations.
Victor Montagliani, president of Concacaf, which represents football in North and Central America and the Caribbean, has been tipped as a possible challenger to Infantino, who ran unopposed in 2019 and 2023.
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