SEPP-TIC TANK NOT GONE YET

Blatter can add to stench

He’s done, he says. But Sepp Blatter is not quite gone yet, and so his shadow hangs over the sport for many months to come.

“Ding dong, the witch is dead,” tweeted Drew Carey, long-time celebrity soccer fan and minority owner of the Seattle Sounders. Not quite yet. As one former U.S. soccer official said Wednesday, “Nobody is going to dance on his grave until he’s completely powerless.”

Blatter was the enabler, the patron saint of development grants, who sat atop a mountain of corruption for nearly two decades. Whether or not he personally profited from these transactions, Blatter turned his cheek many times, so that he would never risk sun burn. The arrests of seven FIFA officials and the resignation of the president change that, certainly. But the mountain still stands, built on a long history of bribery and racketeering. Blatter is still there for now, until the special congressional session, which is a crazy situation. “Until that election, he continues to carry out his functions,” FIFA announced, minutes after Blatter’s speech before a comically near-empty hall in Zurich.

He may yet be president for another half year — through the Women’s World Cup, Copa America, the Gold Cup. He will hand out more trophies and more favors. There remains an implicit threat of political retribution from him and his minions.

Blatter might have avoided this whole carnival show if he had just stepped aside after the arrests of officials, two days before his election. Arrogance kept him in place, fueling a haughty victory speech and his threat that he would not forget his accusers.

After that display of arrogance, why quit now? Surely there was pressure from sponsors, from Visa and Coca-Cola, which openly welcomed Blatter’s resignation as “a positive step for the good of the sport.” But much more importantly, news reports indicate he had become a target of investigations by the New York-based FBI and by U.S. prosecutors — even though an independent Swiss probe had spared Blatter, a native son.

“Pending indictment? Just a guess,” former U.S. goalkeeper Tony Meola tweeted.

The U.S. and its national institutions are the heroes in all this. We did for the world what the world wouldn’t do for itself, after FIFA began to spin further out of control. The profiteering in CONCACAF was blatant. Giving the World Cup to Qatar was insane.

The Americans are doing this at considerable political risk. While the U.S. Soccer Federation does not require money from FIFA, it is desperately hoping to land the 2026 World Cup, a tournament it would seem to deserve now more than ever. The federation can still hope, even, for an unlikely relocation of the 2022 World Cup from Qatar to America’s waiting stadiums.

By bringing down Blatter, the U.S. is alienating his strong voting bloc in Asia and Africa. Maybe because of that, the USSF canceled a telephone conference with its president, Sunil Gulati. Gulati doesn’t want to come across as the sanctified choir boy, or appear too pleased with himself.

Gulati released a statement that said Blatter’s announcement “represents an exceptional and immediate opportunity for positive change within FIFA. . . . This is the first of many steps towards real and meaningful reform within FIFA.”

In the presidential election last week, Gulati voted for Ali bin AlHussein of Jordan, who should now be viewed as the slight favorite to succeed Blatter. Don’t believe those Euro bookies, who list Michel Platini as the favorite. Platini, president of the Union of European Football Associations, is unlikely to receive enough votes from outside Europe and North America. There is a lot of resentment toward powerful, rich UEFA from the federations that relied on FIFA for both legitimate and illegitimate aid.

When he finally departs his post — and that day cannot arrive soon enough — Blatter will leave a legacy that is not entirely negative. He brought the World Cup to South Africa, a worthy host, even if that transaction was done in a dirty fashion. Women’s soccer has expanded dramatically.

Too much money has changed too many hands, though. Too many slave laborers have died in Qatar. Money has been stolen. Real lives have been destroyed. Too much nonsense has transpired, for too long. Now wait for too many months more, until the man with the big smile and the big machine goes away for good.

Sooner than later, please.