BLATTER PROMISES A NEW FIFA

Blatter sought to turn the page on the damaging World Cup bidding and corruption allegations after an executive committee meeting in Zurich, although he admitted that some collusion among FIFA’s decision makers was inevitable.

Nonetheless, FIFA’s president underlined that they were taking on greater responsibility now that world football’s showcase event was gaining more than sporting stature.

“Having this importance also in the economy, then we have a political dimension,” Blatter told journalists.
“Now we have to have a look at how to act in the future to avoid such situations, definitely this is an item which is now under scrutiny,” he added, a day after FIFA’s ethics committee banned two executive committee members for one to three years over bribery or misconduct.

Blatter said all nine bids were expected to bring top political leaders to Zurich on 2 December to back their final pitch to host the 2018 and 2022 events.

“A new FIFA is taking the responsibility to decide on the two World Cups in 2018 and 2022,” FIFA’s president said.

“We won’t have a G7 or G20, we’ll have a G9 with heads of state and prime ministers,” he added.

England, Russia and joint bids by Spain-Portugal and Netherlands-Belgium are in the running to host the 2018 World Cup while Australia, the United States, Japan, Qatar and South Korea are bidding for 2022.

FIFA’s ethics committee on Thursday handed down fines and suspensions of one year for Oceania confederation chief Reynald Temarii and three years on Nigeria’s Amos Adamu following newspaper allegations of vote-buying opportunities in the race to host the World Cup in 2018 and 2020.

Both men intend to appeal.

Four other footballing officials were also sanctioned, but the ethics probe threw out allegations of illicit collusion between bidders Qatar and Spain-Portugal in an exchange of favours between 2018 and 2022 candidates.

Blatter said Friday that with eight of the 22 remaining executive members affiliated to countries that have bids, ‘you cannot avoid collusion’.

The 2022 candidate Australia is the only one of the bidding nations without an official on the body, which chooses the hosts. Blatter denied that gave the other runners a head start.

“I don’t think so, because there is no representative from Australia I don’t think that places them at a disadvantage.”

Blatter had already pledged to press ahead with the vote without any changes to the rulebook.

“The damage to FIFA’s image is great,” ethics committee president Claudio Sulser said after he handed down the sanctions on Thursday.

Sulser’s committee was only set up in recent years after world football’s decision makers weathered a series of money and influence peddling scandals in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

FIFA vice-president Jack Warner said on Wednesday that British Prime Minister David Cameron had asked to meet him to rally support for England’s 2018 World Cup bid.

Cameron has already met the South Korean FIFA vice president Chung Mong-Joon.