By Andrew Warshaw
August 3 – UEFA presidential candidate Michael van Praag insists he is the right man to ensure unity in European football and offset what he describes as the “forces that want to drive us apart.”
Publishing his manifesto ahead of the election in Athens on September 14 to replace Michel Platini, the Dutch FA boss says the task to take UEFA forward is “urgent” and can only be done with “someone who can build bridges between associations, key stakeholders and different cultures.”
Van Praag is taking on Spain’s FIFA and UEFA vice-president Angel Villar Llona and Slovenia’s Aleksander Ceferin for the top job in European football until 2019 when Platini’s current term ends.
As he embarks on a six-week lobbying campaign, van Praag says UEFA, leaderless since Platini was forced out 10 months ago, has been static for far too long.
“I am utterly motivated to take European football onwards. And the task is urgent,” Van Praag states in his manifesto entitled Building Bridges.
“Although day-to-day matters are being dealt with effectively, UEFA has been virtually standing still for 10 months, and counting. There are a number of important issues to be dealt with which have not been addressed at all in that time.”
“Europe is changing; far-reaching economic and geopolitical developments are coming thick and fast and are impacting on football. We need to counter these threats. We can only do so together, which means we need to protect our unity. There are dangers lurking. Forces that want to drive us apart. Forces that threaten the heart of football.”
Although he didn’t identify these, van Praag might well have been referring to the threat of a breakaway European super league. Or the air of distrust and division that now pervades much of UEFA. Or both. In his manifesto, he specifically addresses the former.
“Countering the threat of clubs setting up a ‘Super League’, Football can only grow if it also gets the chance to develop laterally,” he writes. “An optimum financial situation needs to be achieved for the clubs and associations. But this must benefit all clubs, not just a happy few. Threats of a ‘breakaway league’ must not be repeated, ever.
“Fragmentation will result in the loss of our shared football values, which we have spent decades building up together within UEFA.”
But why choose him as UEFA leader after having pulled out of the race to succeed Sepp Blatter as FIFA president back in February?
“Because we cannot afford to lose any more time, it is important to choose someone with experience,” answers van Praag. “Someone who can get straight to work. Someone with a large internal and external network that includes Brussels; someone who knows what it takes. Someone you can safely entrust with European football.”
Van Praag is seen by many as the safest pair of hands at a time when UEFA needs a diplomatic arm around its various factions. Although at the age of 68 the Dutch FA boss is unlikely to remain in charge beyond 2019, he has the important advantage of having seen the club-versus-country issue from both sides as a former boss of Ajax and head of the old G14 grouping that gave way to the European Clubs Association.
“I have had a lifelong apprenticeship in the role of football administrator,” he writes. “Under my leadership, a solid foundation will be laid in order to provide the best platform possible for those who follow. We are going to change, we will change. We will continue to develop and we will remain alert to what threatens our sport; we will never let ourselves be driven apart by economic and political games.”
“I am honest, straightforward and I tell it like it is. When in June 2014 I expressed criticism of Sepp Blatter’s FIFA, it was with no other intention than to heal FIFA, which had been so criticised and torn apart. To restore people’s belief and confidence in football. To reunify the football world. My drive to again be a unifier plays a major role in my ambition to become president of UEFA.”
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