By Andrew Warshaw
May 30 – Damning claims have emerged of how FIFA president Gianni Infantino plotted to overthrow the official who fixed his salary and sought to cut colleagues’ pay to boost his own income.
May 30 – FIFA has punished seven nations – including Mexico, Chile and Croatia – for discriminatory behaviour from supporters, including homophobic chants.
Croatia, whose fans have a track record of incurring the wrath of the authorities, have been ordered to play their first two 2018 World Cup qualifiers behind closed doors and have been fined SFr150,000 for incidents which took place in friendly matches against Israel and Hungary last month.
Chile have been barred from playing at their Estadio Nacional Julio Martinez Pradanos home for two official matches,
First Domenico Scala, now Markus Kattner. Two big fish with key roles to play in monitoring FIFA’s good governance. Yet both gobbled up in deadly, shark-infested waters within the space of a few days under the new regime of Gianni Infantino.
By James Dostoyevsky
UEFA is in a quagmire of its own making and one that is much welcomed by Gianni Infantino, the ‘little child’, who ascended to the FIFA Emperor’s Throne, only to stumble from blunder to blunder, with no end in sight.
Are we really to believe that the indiscretions of FIFA’s finance director Markus Kattner have only been discovered in the past few days? Do they really think that their member federations, the watching press and the rest of the football world are that stupid and will lap it up unquestioningly?
By Andrew Warshaw
May 24 – And another one bites the dust. Markus Kattner, FIFA’s interim secretary-general and long-time director of finance, has become the latest high-profile figure linked with the organisation’s corruption-tainted past to be thrown out.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 23 – He had apparently said goodbye to his staff without even having been told officially by his employers that he is surplus to requirements and is being replaced by the self-styled Special One. But according to the BBC, it is now official. Louis Van Gaal is leaving Manchester United after two years of a three-year contract and is currently discussing severance terms.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 20 – In a trouble-shooting exercise to offset the resignation of one of his most important anti-corruption watchdogs, FIFA president Gianni Infantino has sought to claim the moral high ground by denouncing what he described as “premature conclusions and speculation”.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 20 – The career of Wolfgang Niersbach (pictured), for so long the rising star of German football administration who was touted as a potential leader of UEFA, has suffered a potentially fatal blow with FIFA’s ethics committee recommending a two-year ban and a SFr30,000 fine be imposed on him following an investigation of Germany’s 2006 World Cup bid.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 19 – Having taken FIFA’s membership completely by surprise with the announcement of Fatma Samoura as his new general secretary, Gianni Infantino’s team building has continued with Norwegian football federation official Kjetil Siem being hired in the new role of director of strategic matters.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 18 – Two-time FIFA presidential candidate Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan has angrily condemned Gianni Infantino for a “complete betrayal” of FIFA’s membership following Infantino’s controversial power grab at last week’s Congress in Mexico.
FIFA picks its jury for first Diversity Award
May 18 – The last jury members have been named for the first FIFA Diversity Award, which will be presented in July 2016. US World Cup winner Abby Wambach, former captain of the German national team Thomas Hitzlsperger, and former Dutch international Clarence Seedorf are the big name players to join the 11-person jury.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 17 – FIFA’s first ever female secretary general, Fatma Samoura, has vowed “to help football restore its tarnished image” and says she should be given time to make her mark despite having negligible footballing experience.
By Paul Nicholson
May 17 – Seemingly at the centre of everything FIFA president Gianni Infantino did during the FIFA Congress in Mexico City last week were his band of legends. Whether it was accompanying him on his whistle stop visits to confederations, being introduced one-by one and embraced at the opening ceremony, sitting in the front row of the Congress itself, or Infantino sitting on the bench while the icons played 9-a-side knockabout matches in the iconic Azteca Stadium,
By Andrew Warshaw
May 16 – FIFA have gone into overdrive in an attempt to play the victim following the rift between Gianni Infantino and his independent financial watchdog Domenico Scala that led to Scala’s dramatic resignation less than 24 hours after the FIFA Congress in Mexico.