Three-horse race for top FIFA post

THERE are runners filling all eight lanes of the track in the race for the FIFA presidency but only three contenders have any realistic chance of winning when the starting gun sounds today.

The big three players in the four-month campaign leading up to the election on February 26 will be Bahrain’s Sheik Salman Al Khalifa, UEFA general secretary Gianni Infantino and South Africa’s Tokyo Sexwale — in that order.

Salman, despite facing human rights questions, and Sexwale had been expected to put their names in by last night’s deadline. But Swiss lawyer Infantino is a late heavyweight addition to the contest. He has the unanimous backing of UEFA’s executive committee following the uncertainty over the candidacy of their suspended president Michel Platini.

Infantino said: ‘My manifesto will be based on the need for reform and a FIFA that genuinely serves the interests of all 209 national associations.’ He would step down in the unlikely event of Platini being cleared of all charges.

Infantino has the advantage of 15 years worth of experience in top-level football administration that is unblemished apart from one brief controversy involving his private life. However, Sheik Salman is likely to garner more global support, while Sexwale has a difficult relationship with interim FIFA president Issa Hayatou from Cameroon.

The other candidates are Prince Ali of Jordan, Trindad and Tobago’s David Nakhid, former FIFA executive Jerome Champagne, Liberian FA president Musa Bility — all of whom have little or no chance of winning — and Platini. REMI GARDE has yet to be officially named as the new manager of Aston Villa. But Wikipedia were so sure the Frenchman would be appointed that they listed him as being in charge at Villa Park at 4.29pm last Sunday. DAVID BECKHAM (right) has a £20million long-term ambassador role with Sky but that doesn’t prevent him from working with the BBC on a film spreading the football gospel by playing seven games in seven continents. Beckham’s Sky deal does not include a programming clause, although his camp offered the world trip project to Sky before coming to an agreement with the Beeb. BELEAGUERED RFU chief Ian Ritchie will join NFL commissioner Roger Goodell in speaking the day before the Rugby World Cup final to a sports business audience in London about growing their sports internationally. Ritchie could certainly tell them how not to do it — don’t preside over the first host country to exit the Rugby World Cup at the group stage and lose a once-in-a-generation opportunity for rugby in this country. The paranoid RFU are not allowing any media to attend.