INFANTINO: under fire for secret Saudi deal
Gianni Infantino’s appearance in the Football Leaks series was overtaken rapidly in headline terms by the far more intriguing tales of how Paris Saint-Germain and Manchester City had blasted holes in financial fairplay – admittedly, when he was UEFA general secretary.
The documented leaks showed him up as having meddled in the refashioning of the FIFA ethics system but this was not new in itself; he had already set out his cards by pushing through Congress the replacement as judge and prosecutor of Hans-Joachim Eckert and Cornel Borbely by Vassilios Skouris and the compromised Maria Claudia Rojas, who was recommended by a federation president later alleged to have profiteered on World Cup tickets.
The more contentious issue surrounding Infantino emerged from separate leaks to German paper SuddeutscheZeitung about his pursuit of a rights sell-out deal to a British/Japanese/Saudi consortium. Entities named included UK investment group SB Investment Advisers Limited, London-based investment company Centricus Partners and Japanese conglomerate Softbank, which benefits from a significant investment by the state fund of Saudi Arabia.
The deal first came to light last March when Infantino asked FIFA Council to clear him to negotiate a $25billion, 12-year offer for a global nations league and expanded Club World Cup.
Infantino said he had signed a nondisclosure agreement and could not share any further details with Council about what or whom they would be welcoming aboard.
European members of Council, including German DFB president Reinhard Grindel, objected. Infantino’s further attempts to progress the issue have been similarly blocked. A taskforce, led by Infantino, is due to report back to Council in March 2019.
SuddeutscheZeitung claimed subsequently that the $25bn was for far more than “merely” a nations league and Club World Cup. Also handed over would be all FIFA’s commercial and marketing rights, including those relating to the crown jewels of the World Cup.
This would include revenue from rights to all satellite and network transmissions, archives, movies and videos, e-sport games and merchandising. In other words, not only the family silver but the dining table and chairs plus all the kitchen equipment.
A joint venture company, FIFA Digital Corporation in which FIFA held a 51 per cent stake, would run the business with the FIFA president as joint-chairman of the supervisory board. FIFA and the consortium would each appoint five directors.
For long-time observers of the FIFA of Joao Havelange and Sepp Blatter this recalled the two decades in which its rights were controlled by marketing partner ISL. FIFA was fortunate that, when ISL collapsed, the small print reverted all rights to the world football body.
The “Project Trophy” documentation included a fiercely critical assessment from Marco Villiger, then FIFA’s legal director. Villiger left FIFA suddenly in August. Coincidentally, the revelations emerged around the time Villiger and his former FIFA German assistant, Jorg Vollmuller, were announcing the launch of a sports consultancy.
First to object publicly was Grindel, who urged Infantino to “put all the facts and information on the table”. Grindel added: “It can’t be that every day there are new rumours and speculation.
“It cannot be correct that even after eight months we are still speculating on the exact basis of this ominous offer. It is important that the FIFA president stands for integrity, transparency and compliance.”
Then came UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin, who responded to a question by saying: “It’s hard to have an exact view on something you don’t know anything about.”
More specifically, Ceferin added: “Do you see any difference between a private Super League and a competition that is completely secret and which is 49 per cent sold to a private fund and started by secret talks only with a few big clubs? Where is the difference between a Super League and a competition like that?”
FIFA has responded to the media storm by dismissing the report as merely one of many hundreds of such documents and that it was outdated. It added: “This does not allow conclusions to be drawn until a decision has been taken or a proposal accepted.”
Supporters of the proposal, notably in Africa and Asia, insist that separating the commercial entity from the governing body would allow a reduced FIFA to revert to its core role of concentrating on competition and development plus unified application of the laws of the game.
After all the expansionist shenanigans under Havelange and Blatter, that is an argument which may carry some weight.
Infantino doubtlessly hopes so.
“It cannot be correct that even after eight months we are still speculating on the exact basis of this ominous offer” German DFB president Reinhard Grindel