From FIFA president to great reformer? Don’t believe it,
Now he wants to be a reformer? Don’t believe it
Even at the moment of his final defeat Tuesday, Sepp Blatter couldn’t give up the bluster and spin and that insufferable habit of painting himself as the hero.
Blatter is going, going and soon to be gone as FIFA president, no longer able to either idly sit by while soccer’s governing body wreaks mass-scale corruption or directly involved in it himself, depending on whom you believe.
Four days after pumping his fists and celebrating re-election to a fifth term in power, a humbled Blatter announced at a hastily convened news conference in Zurich that he was, at last, climbing down from his ivory tower just as the U.S. government’s investigation into FIFA shifts into high gear.
Change is coming, shifts that might shake the game to its foundations, lead to a new leadership structure at FIFA and potentially alter the destination of World Cups, including the ludicrous decision to take it to Qatar in 2022.
Meanwhile, rumor and conjecture swirled Tuesday, primarily because of the timing and nature of the announcement. Blatter, 79, went into his shell in the days after Friday’s election victory against Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan. Some senior FIFA officials did not even know the bombshell was coming.
Investigative journalist Andrew Jennings, who has sought to expose Blatter and his system for years and says he gave the FBI the information that sparked last week’s indictments against nine senior FIFA members, suggested the possibility that Blatter might be cooperating with the Justice Department.
Two U.S. officials told USA TODAY Sports that Blatter is part of the government’s overall investigation. The officials were not authorized to comment publicly because the probe is ongoing.
Was the derision from across the globe and the approaching footsteps of serious legal authorities with serious power and supreme confidence enough to take the swagger out of Blatter’s step?
Well, he was humbled enough to admit that while he had the backing of the majority of 209 bureaucrats and cronies within FIFA’s antiquated and hopelessly flawed elective structure, that support was totally absent among the hundreds of millions who play, follow and put their hardearned money into the game.
Yet he was still not humbled enough to resist portraying himself as the great reformer, undertaking the most noble course of action for the good of the game.
“Since I shall not be a candidate and am therefore now free from the constraints that elections inevitably impose, I shall be able to focus on driving far-reaching, fundamental reforms that transcend our previous efforts,” Blatter said, referring to fresh presidential elections that likely will take place early next year.
So wait a minute: The president of FIFA wasn’t free to clean house until he announced his resignation? Financial clarity and internal investigation couldn’t possibly have been a part of his election campaign?
Of course not, a skeptic might say. There are far too many skeletons, in far too many closets, in far too many countries, for that.
If you thought the kind of farewell tours that athletes approaching retirement undertake from time to time are nauseating, wait until you see the closing stanzas of the Sepp show. It will be ugly, it will be stage-managed and it will ask you to suspend belief and rea- son and possibly mountains of evidence from the U.S. legal authorities.
As he steps down, Blatter will try to make you believe that instead of being the overlord of a bleak period when the beautiful game dived headlong into an ugly pit of greed and alleged criminality, his legacy will be that of the man who allowed it to reform. Don’t believe a word of it. The truth might take some time to fully come out, but don’t believe for a second that Blatter will move aside in a gesture of pure and unfettered self-sacrifice. He fought too hard, for too long, to cling on to power for that.
Maybe it was the thinly veiled hints from Attorney General Loretta Lynch, the FBI and those involved in the investigation that there is a lot more scandal to be unearthed.
Maybe Blatter got wind that his support among FIFA authorities was eroding, almost daily.
“I have been reflecting deeply about my presidency and about the 40 years in which my life has been inextricably bound to FIFA and the great sport of football,” Blatter said. “I cherish FIFA more than anything, and I want to do only what is best for FIFA and for football. I felt compelled to stand for re-election, as I believed that this was the best thing for the organization. That election is over, but FIFA’s challenges are not. FIFA needs a profound overhaul.”
The only part of Blatter’s farewell that has any credence was its final phrase. FIFA indeed needs an overhaul, and it has needed one for a long time.
An overhaul is coming, not thanks to Blatter but in spite of him and as a result of the culture he allowed to infiltrate the sport’s highest reaches.
An overhaul is coming to FIFA, not thanks to Sepp Blatter but in spite of him and as a result of the culture he allowed to infiltrate the sport’s highest reaches.