{"id":622747,"date":"2026-08-06T00:53:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-06T00:53:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/622747\/"},"modified":"2026-08-06T00:53:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-06T00:53:12","slug":"gianni-infantino-has-full-support-of-fifa-executives-after-crisis-meeting-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/622747\/","title":{"rendered":"Gianni Infantino has \u2018full support\u2019 of Fifa executives after crisis meeting \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gianni Infantino<\/a> has the \u201cfull support\u201d of Fifa<\/a>\u2019s management board despite being forced to abandon his plan to sell stakes in a company to run the World Cup<\/a> to private investors.<\/p>\n

The Swiss\u2019 plan was rejected by three continental confederations before it was withdrawn and led to Uefa<\/a> threatening to boycott Fifa competitions until it was scrapped.<\/p>\n

He held a crisis meeting with senior Fifa executives in Morocco<\/a> on Wednesday and emerged with their support.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe FIFA secretary general and members of the FIFA management board reaffirmed their full support for FIFA president Gianni Infantino, as the only official elected by the 211 FIFA member associations,\u201d a statement from the global governing body read.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn turn, the FIFA president reiterated his full support for the FIFA secretary general and the FIFA administration for their necessary and outstanding work in the delivery of his vision.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mattias Grafstrom, the secretary general referenced in the statement, is understood to have written an email to staff on Tuesday in which he described Infantino\u2019s proposal to create Fifa Forward Enterprise (FFE) to manage Fifa competitions and sell a 20 per cent stake to private investors as \u201csad and reproachable\u201d.<\/p>\n

Wednesday night\u2019s statement presented a more united picture following the Rabat summit, however.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Gianni Infantino\u2019s remarkable rise from Uefa bureaucrat to \u2018king of soccer\u2019Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

\u201cFIFA\u2019s top management is fully confident that the outcomes of today\u2019s meeting will strengthen FIFA\u2019s 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 while continuing our mission to develop the game around the world,\u201d it continued.<\/p>\n

The statement said \u201cmistakes were acknowledged\u201d regarding the FFE plan at Wednesday\u2019s meeting.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was agreed that it was not the intention for the FIFA Council and FIFA Member Associations to feel excluded from the process and that the process should have been handled differently. It was further acknowledged that errors were also made after the proposal was leaked to media,\u201d it added.<\/p>\n

The statement confirmed a separate letter had been sent to member associations and the Fifa Council apologising for the errors, along with a commitment that they would not happen again. The statement said Fifa would now conduct a review of what had happened which would then be presented to the council.<\/p>\n

It added: \u201cWith the project withdrawn, it was agreed that FIFA will 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.\u201d<\/p>\n

Uefa has said it has \u201clost confidence\u201d in Infantino, with the English and Welsh football associations among those to have withdrawn support for his re-election next year.<\/p>\n

Before Wednesday\u2019s statement, members of the Fifa Council were understood to be working to achieve the majority of 19 needed to request Infantino to convene an extraordinary general meeting to hold him to account over FFE and the Folarin Balogun case.<\/p>\n

The council members were prepared to force a \u201cgovernance boycott\u201d if they could not reach the majority, or if Infantino refused the request to hold a meeting. Councillors intended to stay away from meetings, therefore effectively incapacitating Fifa operations, such is their anger at Infantino\u2019s conduct.<\/p>\n

The Press Association understands that anger has only been further stoked by the stance adopted by Infantino in Wednesday\u2019s update, with sources predicting \u201copen warfare\u201d would ensue.<\/p>\n

Fifa\u2019s chief operating officer Kevin Lamour told the Associated Press last week that the Fifa administration had been \u201cdeceived\u201d by Infantino, while Portugal star Luis Figo joined the criticism earlier on Wednesday, saying Infantino\u2019s conduct over FFE was the \u201clowest, most deceitful, and cravenly self-interested behaviour I have ever witnessed\u201d. <\/p>\n

Elsewhere, the Canadian prime minister Mark Carney said that he had no confidence in Infantino\u2019s leadership.<\/p>\n

Carney\u2019s intervention could be more significant than Figo\u2019s, as the former governor of the Bank of England is close to the Concacaf president, Victor Montagliani, who is being urged to run against Infantino in next year\u2019s Fifa presidential election. \u2013 PA\/The Guardian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Gianni Infantino has the \u201cfull support\u201d of Fifa\u2019s management board despite being forced to abandon his plan to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":622748,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[76],"tags":[995,18,34476,74963,19,17,15847,10456,132,19413,35350],"class_list":["post-622747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-canada","tag-eire","tag-fifa","tag-gianni-infantino","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-mark-carney","tag-morocco","tag-sports","tag-uefa","tag-world-cup"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117045835107429120","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=622747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/622748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=622747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=622747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=622747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}