By Andrew Warshaw
September 1 – He described his original $2 million pay offer as “insulting” yet now he is getting even less. Or is he? After six months in charge, and having failed to sign a contract that had been on the table since March, Gianni Infantino has now apparently agreed an annual salary of 1.5 million Swiss francs.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 30 – The thorny issue of FIFA president Gianni Infantino’s salary has burst into fresh controversy amid speculation that he is about to receive an improved pay deal after refusing to sign his original contract drawn up six months ago.
August 29 – The investigatory chamber of the FIFA Ethics committee has completed an investigation into Saoud Al-Mohannadi, Vice-President of the Qatar Football Association (QFA) and former general secretary of the QFA, and referred it to its adjudicatory body recommending a minimum two-year ban and a CHF20,000 fine.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 25 – Banned former FIFA president Sepp Blatter made his long-awaited appearance before sport’s highest tribunal, the Court of Arbitration of Sport (CAS), today in a last-ditch appeal to clear his name.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 22 – Former FIFA president Sepp Blatter says he is confident of winning this week’s last-ditch appeal against his ban from the game, but that if he fails, he will not allow the rest of his life to suffer unduly.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 19 – Former South African Football Association (SAFA) president Kirsten Nematandani has come out fighting over allegations of ethics violations related to the fixing of international friendlies in 2010 just weeks before South Africa hosted the World Cup.
August 18 – FIFA has rolled out its ‘FIFA 11+ Kids’ programme into Brazil, partnering with the Brazilian Football Association (CBF) and its association of football doctors (CNMF) as part of the World Cup legacy programme, but handily timed with the Olympic football events in the country.
August 16 – Former FIFA president Joao Havelange has passed away, aged 100. In hospital since July with respiratory problems, he died this morning of pneumonia in a Rio de Janeiro hospital.
By Paul Nicholson
August 16 – The Malaysian football federation has pulled out of hosting the 67th Annual FIFA Congress in Kuala Lumpur in May next year, citing security issues and on the advice of their government. The key issue appears to be the refusal of the Malaysian government to provide visas for Israeli delegates.
August 15 – Trials of the video assistant referee system (VAR)has continued in the US with the third tier USL league, working in collaboration with Major League Soccer (MLS).
By Andrew Warshaw
August 12 – Harold Mayne-Nicholls, the former Chilean FA boss who led the FIFA evaluation team for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, has broken his long silence over his ban from the game, accusing FIFA of double-standards and of blocking his attempts to gain justice.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 11 – Just days after he was controversially cleared by FIFA’s ethics committee of any wrongdoing, Gianni Infantino has been plunged into yet more embarrassment over his pledge to clean up the organisation in the wake of the Sepp Blatter regime.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 11 – FIFA has confirmed that new Secretary General, Fatma Samoura will deliver a keynote address as part of the opening of this year’s Soccerex Global Convention in Manchester at the end of September.
August 11 – While FIFA’s Anti-discrimination task force seems to have been consigned to the backburner of projects the governing body doesn’t really know what to do about (not unlike the its former chair Jeffrey Webb who is under house arrest in the US), the Zurich mandarins have announced an awards ceremony to cover what is still one of the most contentious issues in world football.
To lose one FIFA president may be considered unfortunate. To lose two in the space of a few months smacks of carelessness. Apologies to fans of Oscar Wilde for the adulteration of one of his most pithy sayings but it might well be used to characterise last week’s ruling by FIFA’s ethics committee – one of the most momentous and controversial since the body was first set up – to let Gianni Infantino off the hook.