Gianni Infantino: FIFA leaders back under-fire president following crisis meeting as he apologises for ‘mistakes’ over World Cup sell-off | Football News

Under-fire FIFA president Gianni Infantino has shaken off calls to resign – for now – with the backing of the governing body’s leaders, though apologised for “mistakes” in his botched attempts to sell off a stake in the World Cup.

In a statement released after seven hours of crisis talks in Morocco, FIFA said its management board had re-affirmed their “full support” for Infantino – including secretary general Mattias Grafstrom, only days after he had labelled the World Cup plans “a sad and reproachable series of events”. The pair were later seen laughing together watching a Women’s AFCON game in Rabat.

Infantino had faced mounting calls to resign following the leak of previously undiscussed proposals, after it was revealed national associations had not been consulted and had been given a deadline barely a month away in mid-September and the promise of a £30.1m incentive to back them.

In a letter seen by Sky News sent to national associations and signed by Infantino and Grafstrom, the pair wrote that they “sincerely apologised for the errors” in the plans which were eventually withdrawn on Saturday following days of criticism from across world football.

A second statement released publicly through FIFA.com hit back at those critics, threatening that FIFA would “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”.

FIFA said it had “not been the intention… for member associations to feel excluded from the process” and admitted they should have been “handled differently” while further acknowledging “errors were also made after the proposal was leaked to media.”

The governing body also promised a review would be conducted into the fiasco and a report into its findings presented at the next FIFA Council, comprising 37 national representatives from around world football.

Infantino and FIFA’s reputation had taken increasing hits from inside and outside of its own walls over the plans with Arsene Wenger, its chief of global football development, distancing himself publicly while Infantino’s personal senior advisor Carlos Cordeiro quit his role on Friday, labelling them a “bad deal” and “irresponsible”.

The head of the Jordan FA went further by accusing Infantino of “blackmail”, while UEFA announced it had “lost confidence in the current FIFA leadership” and the FA called for a “full and robust review of FIFA’s leadership”.

Those calls had grown further on Wednesday as legendary winger Luis Figo labelled Infantino’s actions “the lowest, most deceitful and cravenly self-interested behaviour I have ever witnessed” while Canada prime minister Mark Carney – whose country had welcomed Infantino in as World Cup co-hosts only weeks earlier – said the incident should be “fatal” for his position as FIFA president.

FIFA did not address those calls directly and instead said the marathon meeting would “strengthen FIFA’s governance, help restore confidence in the organisation and enable us to prepare for the major events and challenges ahead in a united and transparent manner”.

What next for Infantino? ‘Associations have levers to force him out’

Sky Sports News’ chief correspondent Kaveh Solhekol:

Infantino is a man with a very thick skin, obviously he’s aware of what is being said about him – but his feeling all along has been that he was elected president by the 211 associations around the world which make up FIFA and if he’s going to be removed, it’s going to be by them.

The Prime Minister of Canada, Mark Carney, said he’s lost confidence in Infantino. That’s significant because Canada were one of the three co-hosts at the World Cup this summer, and Carney was at the World Cup final two and a half weeks ago sat near Infantino.

I don’t think him refusing to resign is something all the associations around the world are going to accept after losing faith in him. They have a few other levers they can use to try to force him out.

There could be an emergency FIFA Council with a vote of no confidence, and he would be out if he lost. There could be an emergency FIFA Congress, with the same outcome.

If he wants to cling on and wait until the next presidential election in March, he may feel he has the numbers to get re-elected despite the opposition against him.

The date to look out for in that case is November 18, the deadline for candidates to declare themselves.

He has got his calculator out and still feels he has support in different parts of the world – South America, Africa and parts of Asia. He feels he lives to fight another day.

What were FIFA’s World Cup plans?

Under the initial proposal to launch FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE), football’s world governing body aimed to raise up to $4.2bn (£3.1bn) from external investors through the sale of minority, non-controlling stakes in FFE, which it said would be valued at around $20bn (£15bn).

The governing body said its plans – which would have required approval from member associations – could deliver more than $10bn in “football development funding” over the next four years.

Who could replace Infantino?

Sky Sports News’ chief correspondent Kaveh Solhekol:

There’s been talk about the president of Paris Saint-Germain, Nasser Al-Khelaifi, one of the most powerful men in world football, who is on the UEFA executive committee. But my understanding is that he is not interested in replacing Infantino.

Other candidates are people like Sheikh Salman bin Ibrahim Al Khalifa, who came second in the vote to become FIFA president 10 years ago. He’s the president of the AFC, who also oppose the sell-off plans.

Then there’s the president of CONCACAF, Victor Montagliani. We’ve just had the World Cup in three CONCACAF countries and historically, CONCACAF have been close to Infantino, but they said on Thursday that they rejected the proposal as well.

Finally, someone I think would be very popular is Aleksander Ceferin, the president of UEFA. He has a totally different vision about the way football should be run. If he was the president of FIFA, there would be no hydration breaks, no FIFA Peace Prizes, no Qatari-owned private jets for the president, no $1m (£742,000) World Cup tickets.

But I don’t think Ceferin has ever expressed any desire or interest publicly to replace Infantino.

Perhaps we are getting ahead of ourselves. Infantino is under a lot of pressure and it would be fair to say he is fighting for his job, but we are not at the stage where people are going to come out and say they are going to stand against him.