LIVERPOOL
World Team of the Year
They do like a comeback on Merseyside. When Liverpool last won the World Soccer
World Team of the Year award, in 2005, it was on the back of a remarkable fight back from 3-0 down at half-time to beat Milan on penalties in the Champions League Final in Istanbul.
Fourteen years later, a similarly spectacular turnaround helped Liverpool to their sixth European Cup.
In the semi-final first leg against Barcelona they had succumbed to an imperious Lionel Messi, whose individual brilliance probably deserved to be rewarded by a larger margin than the 3-0 scoreline. Yet back at Anfield, and roared on by a capacity crowd hoping for another miracle, Liverpool pulled off the most unlikely of reversals, capped by a winning goal from Divock Origi, who stroked home Trent Alexander-Arnold’s improvised corner.
That dramatic victory set up an allPremier League Final against Tottenham Hotspur at the Estadio Metropolitano in Madrid. On the night, Liverpool’s performance was functional rather than inspirational, but it was in stark contrast to the 2018 Final in Kiev, when Real Madrid had run out 3-1 winners. Then there had been no way back after a first-half injury to talisman Mohamed Salah, whose shoulder was damaged in a tussle with Sergio Ramos, and a howler by keeper Loris Karius which gifted Madrid the opening goal.
Lessons were learned. Brazilian keeper Alisson, signed from Roma for a worldrecord fee of €75million in the summer of 2018, brought a new resilience to a back line superbly marshalled by Dutch defender Virgil Van Dijk. The exuberant front three of Salah, Sadio Mane and Roberto Firmino continued to give Jurgen Klopp’s side the attacking edge but the coach could now call upon new midfield
additions in Naby Keita and Fabinho.
Klopp’s “gegenpressing” tactics in midfield have been a major factor in their success, but their most creative players have actually been the full-backs, Andy Robertson and Alexander-Arnold.
In addition to their Champions League success, Klopp’s men have been unbeaten in the Premier League since a 2-1 reverse to Manchester City on January 3, 2019. The only other defeats in the calendar year have been the FA Cup to Wolverhampton Wanderers, the League Cup to Chelsea and to Napoli in the opening game of this season’s Champions League group. The 49 points gained from their opening 17 Premier League matches represent their bestever start to a league season.
Financially, Liverpool’s success has been far from miraculous. They have the seventh-highest club revenue in the world, the £43.8m paid to agents was more than any other Premier League club, while theirs is the league’s second-highest wage bill, behind Manchester United.
The expansion of Anfield’s capacity to 54,000 has contributed to the financial success, as has the work of research director Ian Graham, whose database of players and team of researchers helped facilitate the purchases of “undervalued” players such as Robertson (Hull City), Salah (Roma) and Fabinho (Monaco), while the sale of Philippe Coutinho, to Barcelona for a substantial profit, enabled big spending on Van Dijk and Alisson.
By the time you read this, Liverpool could well be world club champions to add to their European success. It would be a fitting end to a year in which the club has scaled new heights.
John Holmesdale
In addition to their Champions League success, Klopp’s men have been unbeaten in the Premier League since January
No other figure in the history of Bayern Munich, not even
Deutschland icon Franz Beckenbauer, has been as loyal to or influential on the Bavarian behemoth as the inimitable Uli Hoeness, who called time on almost half a century of service as world-class attacking midfielder, chief administrator, chairman of the supervisory board and president.
Apart from a short loan spell with Nuremberg at the end of his playing career, Hoeness’ professional and personal life was all about Bayern, with eight brilliant seasons in a vintage side that won three European Cups (1974, 1975, 1976), three Bundesliga titles (1972, 1973, 1974) and the Intercontinental Cup (1976). Then, starting at the tender age of 27, followed three decades as a visionary and shrewd general manager/chief executive, after which he became a fervent and hardhitting presidential voice.
Now 67, he has always been a polarising figure in German football. While Bayern fans loved his total commitment to the cause, supporters of other clubs could not stand him and were appalled by his tendency to buy the chasing pack’s best players and his perceived arrogance.
Anyone or anything that posed a threat to Bayern’s domestic dominance was sure to be met with a virulent tongue-lashing from Hoeness. A prime example was his full-blooded prime-time TV clash with Christoph Daum in 1989 when he roared at the Cologne coach: “You completely overestimate yourself. For once, you have to look up. It’s a ball above you, not a halo.”
Some 11 years later, Hoeness would play a key role in preventing Daum taking over as national coach, hinting the latter was a cocaine user and unfit for the job. Daum initially denied the charge, only for a drug-testing lab to prove otherwise. Daum was duly fired by his club, Bayer Leverkusen, and told by the German federation that he would no longer be considered for the post of Bundestrainer.
But in 2013 Hoeness had his own come-uppance when sentenced to three-and-a-half years in jail for tax evasion. For a man widely regarded as public enemy number one, it was the most sensational of downfalls.
In the credit column, Hoeness clearly has to go down as the mastermind of the all-conquering modern Bayern. During his 30 years in the corridors of power, his beloved Bayern won no fewer than 24 Bundesliga shields and had two Champions League triumphs (2001, 2013), and it was he who laid the foundations for the club’s transformation into a commercial juggernaut.
He was an absolute pioneer in terms of the evolution of football business and the vast majority of his financial calls were to pay off spectacularly, be it the huge emphasis on merchandising, the push for sponsorship cash and pay-TV income, or the opening of Bayern’s sumptuous Allianz-Arena in 2002.
The numbers speak for themselves. When he started out as Bayern general manager in 1979, the club’s annual turnover was a mere 12million Deutsche Mark and only 20 people were employed in their offices on Sabener Strasse.
These days, the operation is on a wholly grander scale, with a turnover of €750million last season, €52.5m in net profit, a thousand people on the HQ payroll and an organisation valued at €2.8billion.
That, allied to copious amounts of sporting success, is the Hoeness legacy.
During his 30 years in the corridors of power, his beloved Bayern won no fewer than 24 Bundesliga shields and had two Champions League triumphs
If there was an award for the most significant football reclamation project of 2019, prolific Norwich City and Finland striker Teemu Pukki would have to be number one on the list of nominations.
Once a byword for potential gone bad, the 29-year-old suddenly and unexpectedly cracked the big time; lauded left, right and centre for his almost freakish capacity to pile up the goals for club and country.
Over the past 18 months, the native of Kotka – a picturesque southern Finnish seaside town – has emerged as one of the most in-form finishers around.
And the end-product statistics don’t lie. Twenty-nine goals last season as Norwich romped to the Championship title, eight more by early December this term in the Premier League, and on the scoresheet no fewer than 10 times in Finland’s qualification for Euro 2020 for what will be their first-ever international finals tournament.
No wonder the local club in Kotka have named their training centre after him. He is Finland’s talisman of the moment, the poacher responsible for nearly two-thirds of their goals en route to the European Championship. Many ingredients have contributed to the national side’s belated embrace of competitiveness – not least the organisational skills of coach Markku Kanerva, the cohesion and spirit of the squad, and a good mix of different types of player – but Pukki has been the side’s magician-in-chief.
A spokesperson for the Finnish church certainly agrees, having recently stated: “Miracles happen through God. And Teemu Pukki.”
The striker’s current status is in marked contrast to the many tough times in his career. During spells with Sevilla in Spain, Bundesliga side Schalke and Scottish club Celtic, he floundered. In his first 60 senior appearances for Finland he only managed a relatively meagre 10 goals. Voted Finland’s best young player at 17, and a full international a year later, he struggled to live up to the hype.
The all-important question is just how did this Finnish caterpillar turn into a butterfly on joining Norwich from Danish side Brondby on a free transfer in the summer of 2018?
Maturity is one factor, so is his muchimproved physical presence. At Celtic, for example, he was often knocked off the ball with relative ease. That does not happen these days.
In Spain, Germany and Scotland he was never one of the trusted chosen few, rarely sure of a first-team spot, but having the total faith of Norwich boss Daniel Farke has worked wonders. While some players respond well to the fierce heat of competition for places, Pukki needs to feel wanted.
And he is a perfect fit for the attackminded philosophy of Farke, who loves a striker that will tirelessly run the channels, is active in combination play, acts the predator in the box and presses the opposition centre-backs. Pukki does all of this and more. A more modest, industrious and unselfish player you could not hope to find.
Norwich, like Finland, know how to bring the best out of him. Mindful that he is not especially strong in the air, the first commandment is to play him in on the floor. His trademark one-touch shooting will do the rest.
While some players respond well to the fierce heat of competition for places, Pukki needs to feel wanted
Happiness comes in three for the 19-year-old Red Bull Salzburg and Norway centreforward whose apparently insatiable hunger for goals has made him the hottest of transfer-market properties.
This season, his first full campaign as a Salzburg starter, the teenager has already notched five competitive hat-tricks for his club, including a treble in his inaugural Champions League test: a 6-2 thumping of Genk.
Only two other players – Wayne Rooney of Manchester United and Real Madrid’s Raul – managed a Champions League triple at a younger age. And just to prove Genk wasn’t a fluke, Haaland continued to amass goals galore, finding the target against Napoli, Liverpool and in the return fixture with the Belgian side.
Phenomenal is the only way to describe his net-busting feats in the last months of 2019. By early December he had scored an amazing 27 goals in 20 matches in all competitions. Should he maintain that sort of effectiveness who knows what his final tally could be. The all-time Austrian league marksmanship record – held by Hans Krankl, who racked up 41 goals in 1977-78 for Rapid Vienna – could even be under threat.
With the benefit of hindsight, Haaland appears to have been limbering up for this season’s goal explosion at the summer’s Under-20 World Cup, where he struck nine times in Norway’s12-0 demolition of Honduras. The opposition keeper that day, Jose Garcia, must still have nightmares about him.
The son of former Norway international Alf-Inge Haaland – who served Premier League sides Nottingham Forest, Leeds United and Manchester City as a toughtackling defender or midfield enforcer – Erling has clearly inherited his father’s bodily power, intensity and singlemindedness. However, he also boasts a host of added extras. He is much taller than his dad, is far quicker, and is more poised and skilful on the ball. He is a dead-eye finisher too, a speciality which Haaland senior only displayed now and then.
Former Norway striker turned TV pundit Jan-Aage Fjortoft is convinced that the strapping kid is on his way to the very top, stating: “The boy is a jewel. His mixture of speed, goal instincts and irrepressible will is sensational.”
Needless to say, more or less every leading club in Europe has his particulars prominently on file, and even though he has three and a half years left on his current contract it would be no surprise if he were to quit Salzburg at the end of the season.
Every day seems to spawn new rumours as to his future, with Spanish daily AS revealing the club have put a €100million price tag on him. Swedish paper Dagbladet believes he will join Manchester United, whose manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was his coach at Norwegian side Molde, while German tabloid Bild are linking him to Bundesliga outfits Borussia Dortmund and RB Leipzig – the big Red Bull brother of Salzburg. Bild has even claimed he could leave in the January transfer window, when a release clause of just €20m could be triggered.
One thing is for sure. The fight for his signature will be a battle royal, with absolutely no quarter given.
Only two other players – Wayne Rooney of Manchester United and Real Madrid’s Raul – managed a Champions League hat-trick at a younger age
When Jill Ellis was a little girl a Victory tour meant going to nearby Portsmouth to see the British warship HMS Victory, on which Lord Nelson died after defeating Napoleon’s navy. This year it meant taking her back-to-back Women’s World Cup winners on a celebratory tour of the United States, her adopted nation.
The fifth and final match of the Victory Tour was a farewell as Ellis, 53, stepped down from coaching the US team.
After 132 matches (106 wins, seven defeats) and five years on the road, she is taking a break to spend time with her wife, Betsy, and adopted 14-year-old daughter at their home near Miami. Then, she has hinted, she’ll take on another challenge, possibly in England.
And there will be no shortage of suitors in the country she left in her early teens when her father, a former Royal Marines commando, began to travel and run soccer schools. Via Singapore and Trinidad & Tobago the family pitched up in Virginia in 1981, and Ellis’ horizons changed. Until then she had only played football with her brother and his friends. In the US, girls did play soccer and Ellis enjoyed a successful college career.
But a life in the game was not in her plans and after graduating she took a job writing technical manuals. It paid well but was dull, so when offered a coaching role assisting US World Cup winner April Heinrichs, for a pittance, she seized it.
Ellis progressed through the college system to become, as her father had, an assistant coach to the national team. Then, in 2014, she was asked to take over after a fractious squad forced out Tom Sermanni. Though Olympic champions, the US squad was ageing and faltering. Ellis put Sermanni’s rebuilding programme on hold, nursed a few egos, and pulled the group together for the 2015 World Cup in Canada.
The US began the tournament moderately, incurring rising criticism, but Ellis shielded her players, tweaked the formation, and then watched the US go on to crush Japan 5-2 in the Final.
Criticism resurfaced after a quarterfinal exit at the 2016 Olympics, but US Soccer backed Ellis. Aware that the world was catching up, she not only refreshed personnel she also sought to refine the method. While the Americans’ superior fitness remained a key strength, more flair and flexibility was required.
Doubts grew as waves of players were trialled but Ellis didn’t lose often and by the time France 2019 rolled around the squad was finely honed. Sure-footed and confident, she managed egos – not every coach would have taken a player as feted and strong-minded as Carli Lloyd, while knowing she would not be a starter, and dealt well with media enquiries about extraneous issues such as Megan Rapinoe’s views on President Trump and criticism over the players’ celebrations at beating Thailand 13-0.
The squad was rotated and tactics adapted. While not always convincing – each knockout tie was a narrow win – the US won all seven matches and were clearly the best team.
Of the XI that began the 2015 Final only five started that of 2019, and with a change from 4-4-2 to 4-3-3 most were in different positions. The best player, Rose Lavelle, epitomised the change in style. Ellis had been vindicated.
She leaves the US national team on a high, but she’ll be back.
After graduating she took a job writing technical manuals. It paid well but was dull, so when offered a coaching role assisting US World Cup winner April Heinrichs, for a pittance, she seized it
In 2015, with both men enjoying great success, Jorge Jesus was asked whether he or Jose Mourinho was the best Portuguese coach. Jesus gave a typically low-key response, saying: “I’m not only the best Portuguese coach, I’m the best coach in the world. I don’t believe anyone knows more about football than me.”
He has never hidden his ambition to prove it, either. Yet despite being linked to, among others, Paris Saint-Germain and Milan on the back of resurrecting the fortunes of Portuguese colossus Benfica, that big European job never came. When Jesus took charge of Al Hilal in Saudi Arabia in 2018, at 64 years of age, it appeared that his career was winding down to a nondescript conclusion.
So it was a big surprise when he left before his contract had terminated to take on a familiar task of reawakening a sleeping giant, this time Flamengo in Brazil. But in a country that notoriously looks upon foreign coaches with suspicion, Jesus was not exactly welcomed with open arms.
In a remarkable rant, Fox Sports Brazil journalist Marco Vargas railed against the appointment, saying Jesus was too old, that his successes had been in a league that is worth nothing and concluding that the Portuguese was “too far from our reality to understand our league”.
Opposition coaches were also less than complimentary, prompting Jesus to hit back and say: “I’d like to remind my Brazilian colleagues that in Portugal we had a Brazilian in charge of our national team, [Luiz Felipe] Scolari, who was warmly received by all, and many other Brazilian coaches.
“We tried to learn from them. There was none of this verbal aggressiveness that there is towards me here. I don’t understand this narrow-mindedness.”
Jesus’ most powerful retort, though, has been on the pitch. When he arrived, Flamengo’s big investment in their squad had not paid dividends and with one third of the season gone they were eight points adrift of top spot. An incredible run of 23 victories, four draws and just two losses later, Jesus had led Fla to the title, winning it by a massive 16-point margin.
Yet that wasn’t even the best of it. Not satisfied with conquering Brazil, he led Flamengo to Copa Libertadores success – a competition they had only won once before, when a Zico-inspired team lifted the trophy in 1981.
The success of Jesus’ appointment was absolute, both in substance and in style. All resistance was thoroughly quashed as local pundits and coaches swapped the criticism for gushing praise.
“We’ve had some foreign coaches before in Brazil but I don’t think any of them compare to him,” commented Pele.
Most significantly, Flamengo’s players, lined up to shower him with praise. “I’ve worked with lots of coaches, but what he sees in the game is not normal,” said Gabriel Barbosa. “What we did is all down to him. He’s the best.”
Bruno Henrique, another forward transformed under the Portuguese, said: “Jesus helps players to evolve, I’m living proof of this,” while Spaniard Pablo Mari commented: “Jesus changed my life. The team is at this level because of him.” Flamengo have made strong overtures for Jesus to extend his stay in Rio de Janeiro, but it is little surprise he is keeping his cards close to his chest.
His stunning success could at last open the doors to one of Europe’s heavyweights and, at 65, Jesus knows this will certainly be his last chance to prove that’s where he deserves to be.
In a country that notoriously looks upon foreign coaches with suspicion, Jesus was not exactly welcomed with open arms
The past year has been an enjoyable one for players who were let go by Arsenal. Serge Gnabry established himself as a key man for Bayern Munich and Germany; Carlos Vela was voted the most valuable player in MLS following his performances for Los Angeles; and Chuba Akpom is thriving at PAOK, winning the Greek league and cup double.
To that list, the name of Ismael Bennacer can be added. The 22-yearold midfielder was the player of the tournament as Algeria won the Africa Cup of Nations in Egypt. He then returned to Europe to complete a high-profile move to Milan from Empoli. Arsenal, who scouted and signed him at 18, retained the right to re-sign him via a clause in his Empoli contract, but they declined to match Milan’s £14.4m offer.
Born in Arles in southern France to an Algerian mother and Moroccan father, Bennacer represented France at youth level before joining the growing band of players who have switched their senior allegiances to Algeria.
He made one appearance in England for Arsenal, as a sub in a League Cup win over Sheffield Wednesday in 2015, before being sent on loan to Tours, who were then in France’s Ligue 2, before being allowed to leave to join Empoli in 2017.
At the Cup of Nations, he helped Algeria to their first title in 29 years. He was the tournament’s joint-top assist provider and his passes included one for Baghdad Bounedjah’s winning goal in the Final against Senegal. In addition to being named player of the tournament he was also voted the best young player.
He was one of 10 players to make the shortlist for CAF’s African Footballer of the Year award, alongside favourite Sadio Mane of Liverpool and Senegal.
Bennacer has endured a steep learning curve at Milan, where their poor start to the season led to the sacking of coach Marco Giampaolo. But under Giampaolo’s replacement, Stefano Piolo, the Algerian has emerged as the key
midfield pivot, despite a poor disciplinary record – seven yellow cards in 10 Serie A appearances – which has already resulted in a suspension.
La Gazzetta dello Sport commented: “The midfielder was the protagonist of Algeria’s victory in the summer. Today he is also the master of the Rossoneri midfield; he has no rivals…he is the master of his role.”
Players of African heritage have had a tough time in Serie A over the past year, with the authorities reluctant to take action to punish supporters engaging in regular incidents of racial abuse.
But Ismael Bennacer is growing into his role, citing Andrea Pirlo as his role model. “Boban [Milan’s chief football officer] always reminds me of him.
“He says to me: ‘Look how Pirlo played. He wasn’t very fast but he knew where the ball went and where his team-mates were. His position was always perfect.’ Now I’m studying it in videos.”
Arsenal have retained a 30 per cent sell-on clause for any future transfer. That could prove to be a tidy piece of business for one that got away.
“Today he is also the master of the Rossoneri midfield; he has no rivals...he is the master of his role”
La Gazzetta dello Sport on Bennacer
I prefer to leave football before football leaves me,” David Villa told a press conference to announce his retirement from football at the age of 38. “I’ve been thinking for several years, when you reach 33, 34 or 35, the moment can arrive at any time in a game, in training or with an injury.”
He ended his career as Spain’s alltime top scorer, with 59 goals in 98 international appearances. In a club career spanning two decades he played 764 games, scoring a staggering 381 goals for La Liga clubs Sporting Gijon, Zaragoza, Valencia, Barcelona and Atletico Madrid, followed by spells in Australia (Melbourne City), USA (New York City) and Japan (Vissel Kobe).
Villa played what he thought was his last Spain game against Australia at the 2014 World Cup, when the holders exited the tournament at the group stage. But in 2017, having decamped to MLS, he was recalled to the national side by Julen Lopetegui for one final game, in the 2018 World Cup qualifiers.
His form in four seasons at New York City – 80 goals in 126 games – was a reminder of just how prolific he has been. Though never mentioned in the same breath as World Cup-winning teammates Xavi and Andres Iniesta, a brief look at the strikers that Spain have tried since his departure is proof of his brilliance. The likes of Fernando Llorente, Michu, Alvaro Negredo, Roberto Soldado, Paco Alcacer, Iago Aspas, Aritz Aduriz, Diego Costa and Alvaro Morata have all been used, but none have come closing to matching his strike-rate.
“I have had a very good journey and above all I have been happy,” he says. “I have had good experiences on and off the field. I have been a very lucky guy and I have experienced great things through football.”
“I would like to have won more titles. Leagues, Champions Leagues with Atletico Madrid, or win with Valencia a more important title than that Copa del Rey. Or to have helped Sporting Gijon to [get promoted] to La Liga. In every club you go through there is always something left to do.
“I would like to have played in the Premier League as well. But I made my decisions and it really wouldn’t be fair to complain that I missed out on something when I had such a complete career.
“I have been very lucky for what I experienced. I wouldn’t change anything.”
A final season in the J.League was spent alongside Iniesta at Vissel Kobe. Though Vissel did not challenge for honours, Villa scored in his final league match, a penalty in a 4-1 win over Jubilo Iwata, and celebrated with his family – wife Patricia, daughters Zaida and Olaya, and son Luca – on the touchline.
He now heads back to the USA, where he is the lead investor in Queensboro FC, who will join the USL Championship in 2021. “We are very excited about this team in the Queens’ neighbourhood, that will give us a lot of joy,” he says.
“In addition, we will work in the academies to give opportunities to children and let them have experiences like I had in football when I was a child, when I fought to be a football player. Now, with more time, I will be able to visit all the academies we have in the world and open new locations in other countries.”
“I have had a very good journey and above all I have been happy. I have had good experiences on and off the field. I have been a very lucky guy”
While the Copa America, Africa Cup of Nations and Women’s World Cup may have been the headline-grabbing international events of 2019, the most significant achievement of the year was, arguably, Qatar’s Asian Cup victory in United Arab Emirates.
The tiny nation that is preparing to host the 2022 World Cup won the trophy for the first time with a young team that has made significant progress under Spanish coach Felix Sanchez Bas. In the course of the tournament they scored 19 goals and conceded just one, with Asian powerhouses such as Saudi Arabia, South Korea and, in the Final, Japan, all beaten.
Sanchez Bas had spent years working with various youth teams at the Aspire Academy in Doha and knew exactly what his squad, almost half of whom were 22 or under, were capable of.
Striker Almoez Ali took the spotlight when he scored with a spectacular overhead kick in the Final for his record ninth goal of the tournament, but it was his team-mate Afif who was the man of the match. And in December Afif was also named the continent’s Footballer of the Year by the AFC.
Afif provided 10 assists in seven games during the Asian Cup and also played a starring role in Al Sadd’s run to the Asian Champions League semi-finals. The club, who are coached by former Barcelona and Spain midfielder Xavi, won the 2019 Qatar Stars League, with Afif contributing 26 goals in 22 appearances.
Afif comes from a footballing family. His father Hassan, was born in Tanzania of Somali heritage and moved to Qatar to play for Al Ittihad, while his elder brother Ali has made more than 60 appearances for the Qatar national side. The Dohaborn 23-year-old is a product of the Aspire academy and spent time at Eupen, the Belgian feeder club financed by the Qataris, before becoming the first Qatari to join a Liga club when he moved to Villarreal in 2016.
The forward saw little action in Spain, apart from a few games on loan at lower-league Sporting Gijon, and since 2018 he has been back on loan at Al Sadd, where he has thrived.
Xavi was quick to pay tribute to Afif’s AFC award. “It’s well deserved,” said the Spaniard. “He was making the difference in the national team and with us, Al Sadd, until the semi-finals of the Champions League. It was a pity that we couldn’t reach the Final but it’s a pleasure to coach him. He’s an unbelievable talent, a big player, so I’m very happy for him.”
According to Xavi, the future is bright for Afif and he adds: “There are no limits for him. I’ve told him many times he’s an amazing player, he has many capacities to play football. He’s a talent, so he can play everywhere.
“But it depends on him: his mentality, his ambition, because he has everything to play football. “Obviously he’s one of the best players in the national team. This is an amazing generation that Qatar have, they will compete well in 2022.”
“It’s a pleasure to coach him. He’s an unbelievable talent, a big player”
Former Spain midfielder Xavi
The omens were not good for Vassilios Skouris when he was appointed president of the adjudicatory chamber of FIFA’s ethics committee. Skouris, from Greece, was handed an investigatory partner in Maria Claudia Rojas from Colombia, who was known to possess limited English, the
lingua franca of international sports law. Not only that but Skouris and Rojas had been parachuted into the Swisscentred FIFA legal matrix in place of the two men who had rid world football of the hitherto all-powerful president Sepp Blatter and his ally-turned-challenger Michel Platini, head of the world game’s richest region in Europe’s UEFA.
But almost three years after the Mexico City congress at which Gianni Infantino had changed the ethics guard, 71-year-old Skouris is now gaining respect for his undertaking of this peculiar role.
Commenting on the appointments of Skouris and Rojas, FIFA said: “These individuals have been chosen because they are recognised, high-profile experts in their respective fields. Moreover, they better reflect the geographic and gender diversity that must be a part of an international organisation like FIFA.”
The ousted pair – German judge Hans-Joachim Eckert and Swiss lawyer Cornel Borbely – were not impressed. Borbely warned that hundreds of cases would be frozen while the newcomers settled in, arguing: “This is a huge setback. The reform process has at least stepped backwards for several years.”
Not surprisingly, Skouris and Rojas made a slow start. Finally, seven months after their appointment came the first evidence of major intent: a life ban on Brazilian federation president and former FIFA ExCo member Marco Polo del Nero.
The Del Nero case was one of several dozen arising out of the FIFAGate scandal. Separately Skouris and Rojas had to sweep up the disciplinary debris left over from the South African matchfix scandal on the eve of the 2010 World Cup hosting. Next came a steady stream of corruption cases involving senior CAF and national FA officials.
Skouris and Rojas have been fortunate, up to a point. The South African cases focused on the activities of the notorious fixer Wilson Raj Perumal. Much of the investigatory groundwork had been undertaken by former FIFA security director Chris Eaton. Rojas and Skouris had to do little more, in comparative terms, than finish the job.
Picking up the FIFAGate cases has involved extensive work but, here again,
Skouris and Rojas have fallen on their feet. Firstly, much of the condemnatory evidence was gleaned from the New York court cases; secondly, Rojas understood the Hispano/American language and culture of most of the guilty men.
Beyond that, Skouris and Rojas have raised the bar set by Borbely and Eckert.
They have worked steadily through the schedule and have another 16 months in their jobs. That timescale will present more FIFAGate cases, the likely fallout from the current chaos within the African confederation and more match-fixing.
For many years the phrase “FIFA ethics” has been considered an oxymoron, a contradiction in terms. How long that remains the case depends on a Greek bearing law books.
Skouris and Rojas have another 16 months in their jobs. That timescale will present more FIFAGate cases, the likely fallout from the current chaos within the African confederation and more match-fixing