Pay back time?

I wonder if David Cameron is having a little chuckle to himself as FIFA slowly tears itself apart?


British Prime Minister Cameron was encouraged to perform like a circus animal for FIFA as he Prince William and others tried to gather enough votes to win the 2018 World Cup Finals bid for England. They were promised votes and then slapped in the face when only two were received. Twenty-two delegates voted (after two had been suspended pending investigations of corruption allegations) and of the two votes won, one was from the English FA itself.

David Beckham, Sir Bobby Charlton and other notable sports personalities were also busting a gut to win the bid, but with due respect to them, you can afford to insult a sports personality and get away with it. Not so with a serving head of government or a future head of state.

I said to friends at the time that I couldn’t imagine Cameron (or any other politician come to that) turning the other cheek and, while I’m not suggesting for a moment that an ‘official’ policy was drawn up by Downing Street to wreak revenge, if I was Cameron I’d certainly have asked someone to explore ways of returning the insult … with interest.

Former FA chairman Lord Triesman was ‘coincidentally’ summoned to a British parliamentary inquiry into the governance of football in England and the country's failure to secure the right to host the 2018 World Cup finals. On May 10th 2011 he made bribery allegations concerning four FIFA members (Jack Warner, Nicolas Leoz, Ricardo Teixeira and Worawi Makudi), claiming that they sought bribes in return for backing England's failed bid. The ball had started rolling.

Mohamed bin Hammam was then forced to pull out of the race to become FIFA President after – on May 26th - allegations were made by US Executive Committee member Chuck Blazer about bribes being offered to the Caribbean Football Union in return for Qatar’s 2022 World Cup bid. Coincidentally, Blazer probably also felt a little stitched up in the voting process for that bid. Maybe he and Cameron shared a beer and notes at Zurich airport as they commiserated with each other. Warner was also implicated and an FIFA ethics committee investigation was launched.

Blatter has since distanced himself from his two “old friends” and it looks as though they will be hung out to dry by him. I don’t expect them to take too kindly to this.

Given that it would be monumentally stupid to try and hush these gentlemen up with a suitcase full of dollars, there is little Blatter can offer them now in way of appeasement. Their names have been tarnished for good and so they have nothing to lose by dishing the dirt on others … including old Sepp.

Warner in particular does not seem like the sort of character who will take this lying down. Bin Hamman could well be kept quiet under the threat that the World Cup could be withdrawn from Qatar and moved elsewhere. There is certainly enough time for this to happen.

Maybe they should chat to others who have felt let down and embarrassed by FIFA and ask advice on how cold the dish of revenge should be when it is eventually served? My money is on Warner playing the role of waiter and tipping the lot over Blatter’s head.

FIFA is slowly tearing itself apart at the moment and – for me – that is a good thing for world football. Blatter’s cronies might well have felt safe and secure under his patronage when they blasted the English FA’s suggestion to delay the vote for a new President, but these men have no backbone. They will soon turn on Blatter when the sponsors start getting cold feet about their association with FIFA, tear up contracts and stop the money flowing.

I wonder whether – given the fact that his own ethics committee is throwing out accusations of corruption among members – FIFA chairman Sepp Blatter will issue an apology (and maybe even a word of thanks) to the journalists in England, Germany, Switzerland and elsewhere, whose claims he so quickly dismissed in such a derisory way? I suspect not.

Things people regret saying # 145 …

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin accused the British media of running an “unacceptable” 2018 World Cup bid campaign.

“These countries blame people of corruption, they blame people without any grounds or evidence, it can be seen as putting pressure on FIFA members, and then they put it in their mass media all over the world.”