Sport

English FA unlikely to back Blatter

ENGLISH FA: THE ENGLISH Football Association is unlikely to back Sepp Blatter in his bid to be re-elected as Fifa president.

OWEN GIBSON
Fri May 13 2011 - 01:00

ENGLISH FA:THE ENGLISH Football Association is unlikely to back Sepp Blatter in his bid to be re-elected as Fifa president.

The FA chairman, David Bernstein, expressed reservations about backing Blatter for a fourth term as president, despite his likely re-election, acknowledging to do so would risk ridicule from the public following yet more accusations of alleged corruption inside football’s governing body.

Asked if it would make the FA a laughing stock, Bernstein said: “I don’t think it would go down very well, no.” He refused to elaborate, saying the FA board would make its decision known after considering its vote on Thursday.

The Premier League representatives on the FA board are likely to lobby for Mohamed bin Hammam, the challenger to Blatter, but there will be a strong counter lobby in favour of abstaining. Bernstein said abstention was “a very credible option” and called for greater openness and transparency at Fifa, while also announcing that the FA had appointed a senior QC to conduct an independent review of the former chairman Lord Triesman’s explosive corruption claims.

READ MORE

Bernstein endorsed calls for World Cup votes to be made by the 200-plus countries that make up Fifa’s membership rather than the 24-man executive committee and for the presidential vote to be made public. The 73-year-old Blatter looks likely to secure victory in his bid for a fourth term as Fifa president, with Oceania yesterday becoming the latest confederation to publicly back him.

Bin Hammam, the head of the Asian Football Confederation, has also been damaged by the claims following new allegations the Qatar 2022 bid paid bribes of €1.03 million to two other executive committee members.

If the FA turned its back on Blatter it would mean ignoring the recommendation of Uefa’s executive committee, which has called on its members to back Blatter. When asked whether he could completely trust either challenger, or whether he thought either was “100 per cent clean”, Bernstein declined to answer.

The FA’s inquiry is intended to establish quickly whether there is corroborating evidence to support Triesman’s allegations against four senior Fifa executive committee members.

Guardian Service