01.08.2026, 14:06 Uhr
By John Bagratuni, dpa
Gianni Infantino may have scrapped World Cup investor plans but that is far from the end of a debate on the ruling body FIFA and even more on its beleaguered president.
European body UEFA and the Asian confederation AFC welcomed the decision itself but said that a lot of damage has been done during the just over 80 hours between FIFA's original announcement on Tuesday and the end of the plan early Saturday.
What UEFA and AFC say
"The current FIFA leadership has not only lost UEFA’s confidence but also that of many other members of the football family," a strong-worded UEFA statement said.
"This is a victory for the whole game. But it must not be the end of the story. The proposal has gone. The task of rebuilding trust in FIFA has only just begun."
The AFC said its president Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa "expects that, going forward, any initiative that has the potential to impact global football will be presented and discussed with the Confederations, the FIFA Council, Member Associations (MAs) and other stakeholders in a timely, transparent and meaningful manner."
FIFA had announced on Tuesday that it wanted to sell minority stakes in a planned company overseeing its commercial rights and tournament operations to private investors. Members who endorsed this by September 19 would receive a $20 million bonus.
UEFA said it would boycott FIFA events if the project became reality and the FIFA scheme was also rejected by Asia's AFC and the CONCACAF confederation for North and Central America and the Caribbean.
That meant that FIFA and Infantino would have no majority from the 211 members and Infantino said early Saturday that the plan was now scrapped.
"Having listened carefully to all the views, it has become clear that the project has created divisions of a nature that, regardless of the level of support, are no longer in the interest of the objective set out in the first place," Infantino said.
"Our purpose has always been – and will always be – to unite and improve. As a result, this proposal will not proceed.
"Moving forward, my intent is to bring all interested parties back together in the coming days and weeks in the spirit of shared interest in our game, and with the objective to continue growing football everywhere, particularly in those countries that mostly need our support."
It was the second investor debacle for Infantino who in 2018 also had to withdraw a plan regarding Saudi Arabia investment in connection with a new-look Club World Cup.
Infantino setback ahead of election
Infantino has presided over FIFA since 2016 and is seeking a final four-year term next year. He had vast support from member federations but it remains unclear if that is still the case now.
The outcome is a major defeat for Infantino, who had previously also come under fire for being close with United States president Donald Trump and FIFA scrapping a red card suspension for American player Folarin Balogun at the World Cup after Trump had intervened by phoning Infantino.
Britain's Daily Mail said that Infantino had been "humiliated", L'Equipe in France rated FIFA in crisis and Spain's EL Pais said that Infantino had suffered "a global setback."
Infantino'the wrong man'
UEFA vice president Laura McAllister told the BBC said UEFA would be “considering options” now but that "trust in the president of FIFA has been badly shaken this week," with questions arising "whether he is the leader to take us forward as a global football organisation."
British Prime Minister Andy Burnham said that Infantino was “the wrong man" to lead FIFA, Infantino's senior abviser Carlos Cordeiro resigned and FIFA chief operating officer Kevin Lamour was quoted as saying it was only Infantino's project.
Trump said on Friday he hadn't talked with Infantino about the project which however involved his wider family as the company of Joshua Kushner, the brother of Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, was a planned leading investor.
The scheme, FIFA Forward Enterprise, could have also allowed Infantino to stay involved after the end of his final term as FIFA president in 2031 in a role as CEO or commisioner.
"Trump famously doesn't like losers. Infantino promised him something he could not deliver," Sky UK said. "How long will it be before even Trump decides that Infantino is yesterday's man?"
UEFA spoke of a "shabby, back room, opaque deal he hatched and tried to force through" without any transparency and also questioned why $5 billion of FIFA reserves were not used for the benefit of the game.
"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," UEFA said.
"In the coming days and weeks, UEFA will work with its associations and in close cooperation with other confederations to reflect on how this happened and devise a plan to make sure that it cannot occur again. That review should be thorough and fundamental. No option should be off the table.
"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.
"We must start to use some of that money that is sat idle in FIFA’s bank account to deliver the kick start that the grassroots and the wider game need in each of the 211 countries of FIFA. But we don’t need to sell off the family silver to pay for it."
Source: Dpa-international.com
