FA embarrassed as FIFA lift lid on World Cup bid
A DAMNING report into the bidding process for the 2018 World Cup has revealed the extraordinary lengths England’s doomed campaign went to in trying to secure a single vote. FIFA’s long-awaited investigation, published yesterday, heavily criticises England’s bid to host the 2018 competition — although it praised the FA for their honesty when others refused to co-operate. The report also identifies ‘conduct by England 2018 that may not have met the standards set out in the FIFA code of ethics or the bid rules’. Russia were awarded the 2018 World Cup. The review found:
There was no evidence that Russia’s bid team unduly influenced FIFA voters.
Prince William and David Cameron were present when England 2018 chairman Geoff Thompson and Korea’s Chung Mong-joon agreed to trade votes.
There were flaws in the process caused by a ‘culture of expectation and entitlement’ among FIFA executive committee members whose votes would decide the outcome.
THE full extent of how England tried desperately to secure the 2018 World Cup has been laid bare by a FIFA report into the bidding war.
The revelations in the report by US lawyer Michael Garcia are hugely embarrassing for the FA and those associated with the bid. Most damning is the effort by the English bid team to curry favour with the biggest rogue in the FIFA gallery, Jack Warner.
Following pressure from Warner, the FA organised jobs for Richard Sebro, the son of Warner’s banker, at Wembley, Tottenham and Aston Villa. In a note sent to Warner by Sebro, and obtained by Garcia, he states the FA had spared him a summer working in McDonald’s.
It reads: ‘ My colleagues in Wolverhampton with similar qualifications are competing for extra shifts in McDonalds and I fully appreciate the privilege not having to do that.
‘I met with (FA chairman) Lord Triesman yesterday and he asked for you. I had to honestly reply that I had not heard from you in some time.’
The Garcia report also discloses that David Cameron, then Prime Minister, and Prince William were at a meeting in Zurich in December 2010 when England 2018 chairman Geoff Thompson did a deal to trade votes with Chung Mong-joon of South Korea. The South Koreans were bidding for the 2022 World Cup, which went to Qatar. Vote trading is against FIFA rules.
Garcia acknowledges England appear to be criticised as much as the country which secured the 2022 World Cup — Qatar — only because they co- operated fully with his investigation.
But the report remains s humiliating for the FA, not t least over the manner in n which ‘England 2018 placed particular emphasis on n winning over Jack Warner’, , who at the time was FIFA A vice president and the CON- CACAF president and has since been banned for life from football.
The report quotes bid d team CEO Andy Anson, who o noted Warner was one of three FIFA executive comm mittee members who ‘had a disproportionate amount of power in terms of voting’.
Garcia reveals how, in 2009 09 and 2010, ‘ Warner pressed d England’s bid team to help lp someone “I consider to be my adopted son find a part-time job”.’
Garcia noted that ‘England 2018 officials not only provided this individual, Richard Sebro, with employment opportunities, but also kept Mr Warner apprised of their efforts as they solicited his support for the bid’.
Warner even expressed his ‘profound disappointment’ when the 2018 bid team were slow to respond. ‘ The bid team quickly sought to reassure Mr Warner of its commitment to helping Mr Sebro,’ states the report.
Warner also requested England provide ‘favours and benefits’ to Joe Public, a football team in Trinidad and Tobago owned by Warner. ‘ Whether England ultimately provided benefits to Mr Warner’s club is unclear,’ says the report. ‘ Correspondence shows, however, that England officials appeared willing to do so.’
Warner requested other favours. ‘Mr Warner used his executive committee status to extract benefits for his local member association, the Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation. Once again, England 2018 was willing to help,’ states the report. A request to have money owed by the Jamaican Football Federation to the English FA — $215,000 — waived was not rejected.
Warner messaged Triesman, saying: ‘I crave your kindness and understanding in having the debt of the JFF to your FA be written off in the Jamaican Federation’s efforts at survival.’ Triesman replied: ‘It does need a solution. I’ll see our people next Monday and talk through possibilities, so please forgive me for not responding faster.’ The report says it is ‘unclear whether the FA forgave any debt’.
Warner wanted help to provide cricket facilities in his native Longdenville and an FA delegation was arranged to visit the area and create ‘media hype’. Anson told Garcia there was a request for $50,000 but ‘that was the one time I felt that it was something inappropriate’. The report also states: ‘In yet another example of England 2018’s efforts to curry favour with Mr Warner, the bid team sponsored a gala dinner for the Caribbean Football Union in Trinidad.’ It cost more than £35,000.
Other efforts by the bid team to win backing included a plan for England to play a friendly in Thailand, but this was regarded as a ‘form of bribery’, Thompson admitted when interviewed.
Garcia says another FIFA executive ‘sought to extract benefits from England 2018’, saying: ‘Reynald Temarii saw an opportunity to help his resource-challenged Oceania confederation’.
The report addresses some of the questions hanging over Qatar’s bid for the 2022 World Cup. A former FIFA executive committee member emailed Qatari officials to thank them for ‘several thousand euros’ after they won hosting rights in 2010.
Three other FIFA committee members were flown to Rio in a private jet belonging to the Qatari federation and the Garcia probe details $2million (£1.6m) being paid into the savings account of the 10-year-old daughter of FIFA member Ricardo Teixeira.