Sepp Blatter 's comments to a Brazilian magazine prove once and for all he is not fit to run football. " We have bad losers in FIFA," the FIFA President told Estado de Sao Paolo . "This animosity comes from England," he went on. "Interesting is the timing of the accusations. It was just around the time when they·failed to win host rights to the 2018 World Cup...All this has been an act of revenge for having lost the FIFA Presidency in 1974 to Joao Havelange. Still, they cannot accept that they no longer control FIFA. Since they cannot regain the Presidency, they decided they would try to destroy it." The words of a mad conspiracy theorist. The surge in reports of FIFA corruption came it is true around last year's World Cup vote but that was because both 2018 (Russia) and 2022 (Qatar) seemed highly suspicious choices to any fair-minded watcher. How then to explain the head of the German F.A. and Karl-Heinz Rummenige calling for Blatter's head recently? The fact is England has the most active investigative journalism and endemic FIFA corruption is something Blatter has presided over and allowed to fester. The Football Association and the British media has no desire other than a trustwort hy governing body for the sport it invented. Under Blatter, the FIFA Ex.Co. has looked like an FBI's most wanted list of felons: Warner, Texeira, Leoz, Bin-Hammam, Blazer (pic) and Grondona for starters. If Blatter really believes in transparency and honest management, let him release the judicial verdict on the ISL collapse which languishes in a courthouse in Zug, Switzerland. The F.A. however should look themselves in the mirror for shamefully u-turning to back Blatter in his initial bid for the Presidency, betraying the support of the honest Swede Lennart Johansson. How foolish do they appear now that deep anti-English feeling pervades FIFA corridors. Recent stirrings from Germany suggest that is the country from which a successful anti-Blatter movement should stem. -Sean O'Conor Tags World Cup Pens World Cup Posters Euro 2012 football

Banned Ex.Co. member Mohamed Bin Hammam has slammed Sepp Blatter and Chuck Blazer following his expulsion from football last week. He compared Blatter to a tyrant wiping out his rivals and called for Blazer to go before the FIFA Ethics Committee for receiving suspicious payments. Bemoaning his life ban from football, the former Asian Football Confederation chief told Sky News, "This is the act of the dictators and we have witnessed this through history...When they think that a person is prominent to replace him, the first thing they do is execute him." With reference to his ban for handing out cash for votes, Bin Hammam denied he was guilty, but also admitted that clientelism was an everyday fact of FIFA life. "This is a normal, a normal, normal practice," he confirmed. "This watch is a gift." The Qatari then went on to have a dig at Chuck Blazer , whose whistleblowing began his impeachment process. "We have, during the investigations, discovered that Chuck Blazer himself has received from the Caribbean (Football) Union $250,000. For what, God knows." This news was broken by Andrew Jennings and Blazer's defence sounds, well a little odd. Claiming it was Jack Warner repaying him a loan, he added, "As a precaution, I have set aside these funds and am prepared to return them should it turn out that the CFU was the source of the funds and not Jack Warner as was represented to me." Jennings also revealed Blazer pocketed 10% of CONCACAF's marketing and TV rights money over the past five years, a total of $9.6m. The 66 year-old New Yorker defended his bonuses as "consistent with industry standards." * * * Ricardo Texeira , was it something we said? The Brazilian soccer chief, FIFA Ex.Co. member and former son-in-law of that great dictator Joao Havelange, has something against the English all right. This is what he told Brazilian magazine Revista Paui at the weekend: "The islanders (the English) are the pirates of the world, a bunch of pirates.... The BBC is a state organisation...It’s all orchestrated...I will make their lives hell...In 2014, I'll be able to get away with anything. The most slippery, unthinkable, Machiavellian things. Denying press credentials, barring access, changing game schedules. While I'm at the CBF, at FIFA, they won't get past the door! And you know what? Nothing will happen. You know why? Because in 2015 I'm out of here... " Why do you hate us so much, Ricardo? Are you worried London's smoothly organised Olympics next year will show up your disorganised World Cup two years later or the Rio Olympics in 2018? Oh I remember - you took at least $12m in bribes from FIFA's now defunct marketing company, ISL, your company laundered the money and our media (Andrew Jennings, the BBC et al.) pointed it out, that's right. Oh and you have been awarding yourself contracts for 2014 and you were willing to sell your vote for 2018. The truth hurts, Ricardo. And when the Zug prosecutor's report is finally revealed, you'll be history like Jack Warner and the other crooks in Zurich. Enjoy your time in football while it lasts. -Sean O'Conor Tags World Cup Pens World Cup Posters Euro 2012 football

The winner takes it all. Despite an unprecedented tide of corruption allegations, Sepp Blatter has been crowned the king of football again. For another four years, the septuagenarian Swiss will lord it over the world of soccer from his fortress on a Zurich hill. '51 ideas a day' is the true teflon president, cleverly escaping a planned assault on his throne from Mohamed Bin-Hammam and able to weather a late lunge from his 'bad lieutenant' Jack Warner and a desperate last-ditch strike from David Bernstein. In the end, the tsunami of scandal that Warner promised washed over his punishment-proof castle and he could breath a sigh of relief. The Swiss still calls the shots and while Switzerland remains a country which does not want to engage with the world, there is no body to hold him meaningfully to account. The judicial verdict on the collapse of ISL would probably mean the end of Blatter, but it remains locked in a Swiss vault in Canton, hidden from public viewing. Never mind the worldwide ridicule and condemnation of the bent Executive Committee, over a third of whom have been fingered for dirty deeds. Sepp was re-elected after only 17 of FIFA's 203 voting associations backed the Football Association's last-minute rebellion; 17 others abstained from the proposal to postpone the presidential election, leaving the one-candidate show free to proceed, a pompous waste-of-time that would not have looked out of place in a dictatorship. Dictatorships and FIFA have more than a passing resemblance, although The Sun's blunt 'Spot the Difference' front page plastering Blatter's mug cheek-by-jowl with Colonel Gadaffi's today may have been overboard. There is at least a superficial similarity, as football's governing body has only a pretence of democracy, and are ensconced in the land of the supine Swiss and a government which famously asks no questions. So why is he still in power? It comes down to a difference of perspective. Europe, where the game was born and where the richest leagues are, is made up of largely transparent countries and when corruption occurs in one of them, such as Italy's Calciopoli scandal of 2006, it is exposed and stamped upon. But FIFA is a world organisation of which UEFA is only one constituent part. In much of the developing world Blatter and FIFA is still seen as a force for good, spraying their largesse around the globe in development projects, and giving men from nations like Guatemala, Papua New Guinea and the Ivory Coast seats on the 24-man elite who run world football. The ousting of Stanley Rous in 1974 by Joao Havelange , who was noticeably present at FIFA House today, watching over proceedings like a ghost from the past, was welcomed in much of the soccer world as Rous had been so Euro-centric he had limited Africa and Asia to only one spot at the 1966 World Cup finals, and maintained support for apartheid South Africa in the face of outrage among black African nations. Europe might still have the big money in football, but in terms of FIFA influence, the developed world is outvoted by the developing world. And England, homeland of the game, is as isolated as ever. "This is not a bazaar", thundered Blatter at furious journalists on Sunday, but the ethics of the organisation involve a lot of buying and selling of votes and little reward for merit or integrity. General Secretary Jerome Valcke confirmed as much in his email to Jack Warner , when he wondered if Bin-Hammam was trying to buy the presidency in the same way Qatar had "bought" the 2022 World Cup finals. Germany, after Australia, are the latest country to call that mind-boggling decision into question, but with Blatter back in power, hopes of a re-run of that vote are further away than ever. The overwhelming nature of the presidential election - 186 votes for Blatter with 17 abstentions , gives the Swiss a green light for business as usual. While the world knows FIFA is bent, the opposition cannot muster enough strength to reform it from the inside. One nation, one vote is both a democratic blessing and a curse as minor football nations carry as much influence as major ones. As the clearly stressed Valcke summoned them one by one by name to the polling booth, you had to wonder again why nations like Vanuatu, Kyrgyzstan and the Seychelles have as much say in world football as Brazil, Germany and Italy for instance. Mobilising the developing world has been the key to Blatter's survival as much as it was for his predecessor Joao Havelange. The European howls at blatant bribery do not play as resoundingly to some other ears, who have culturally different levels of tolerance. If there were any doubt there is a continental divide in FIFA, one only had to witness the sickening sycophancy of the delegates from Benin, the D.R. Congo and Haiti, who pledged undying and obsequious loyalty to King Sepp from the podium at FIFA House before the vote, in breathtaking contrast to the cries for transparency and honesty coming from outside the Congress. The most depressing tribute of all came from Argentina's Julio Grondona, who perhaps still bitter at the Falklands War, took the opportunity to indulge in some bashing of 'the pirates', as the English are disparagingly referred to in his homeland. "We always have attacks from England which are mostly lies with the support of journalism which is more busy lying than telling the truth," he said. "It looks like England is always complaining so please I say will you leave the Fifa family alone." Well England has a right to complain, because no-one else is, and corruption grows like bacteria if it is not confronted when it appears. There was some pride to be salvaged in the fact that English accents predominated among the probing reporters at Blatter's tumultous press conference on Sunday, that Fleet Street newspapers have done the lion's share of exposing FIFA corruption and that the unbeatable Brit Andrew Jennings had produced another devastating expose for the BBC only days before the gathering in Zurich. If no other country will keep snapping at the heels of FIFA, then England will have to keep up the chase. But no amount of investigative hacking could prevent Blatter escaping the house-fire intact. Ever the wily politician, he played another trump card only hours before the election by announcing he would open the World Cup voting beyond the 24 Ex.Co. members to each of the 208 national associations, a guaranteed vote-winner. He might have turned a blind eye to years of wrongdoing, and may have been guilty of much of it himself, but Sepp Blatter's extraordinary suvival skills have saved his bacon again. While the 2022 World Cup furor appears to be dying, the issue of Bin-Hammam and Warner's corruption trial remains to be solved, and the Trinidadian will not go down fighting. Watch this space for more fireworks, but it will be a while until there is a week like the last in FIFA politics. (c) Sean O'Conor & Soccerphile Tags World Cup Pens World Cup Posters Euro 2012 football

What a week it has been at FIFA H.Q. Could the den of thieves finally be about to be gutted and the old guard sent packing, bribes and all? By Sunday afternoon, the final stretch of campaigning for the Presidency had become an ugly fire-fight between incumbent Sepp Blatter and the challenger Mohamed Bin-Hammam , with the Swiss apparently emerging from the conflagration the winner after his rival withdrew. Blatter had led comfortably going into this week as news arrived that the African votes were headed his way. Then out of the blue Chuck Blazer , the portly Executive Committee member from the USA, who has backed the uber-crook Jack Warner for two decades, suddenly announcing he had reported Bin-Hammam and his CONCACAF boss to the Ethics Committee for trying to buy vote s from the Caribbean Football Union. On Sunday, Bin-Hammam, seeing his bid for glory going up in flames, retaliated by reporting Blatter to the same committee for not reporting breaches of its laws on his watch. Warner and Bin Hammam were suspended from football activities, while Blatter was let off. Now on Monday, Warner has got his revenge by reporting Blatter for sending unsolicited gifts of computers and cash to CONCACAF, plus revealing an email in which General Secretary Jerome Valcke expressed an opinion that Bin-Hammam was trying to buy FIFA Presidency in the same way Qatar "bought" the 2022 World Cup finals. The ruling class of FIFA are at each other's throats in an almighty cat-fight. So mu ch changes by the day it is hard to keep up with the latest shenanigans. The presidential election on Wednesday will be the most absurd embellishment to this farce, with only one, denigrated and discredited candidate left on the ballot paper. If the FIFA nations have any shame they will follow the lead of the Football Association and allegedly some Asian members in boycotting the ridiculous 'vote' for Sepp Blatter. Surely the 'Salt Lake City moment' we have dreamed about is imminent; if the FIFA house of shame does not fall now in the fallout from the disgraceful 2018/2022 World Cup votes, then when will it ever? - Sean O'Conor Tags World Cup Pens World Cup Posters Euro 2012 football

Chung Mong-Joon, the former FIFA Vice-President, today tweeted that his close friend and AFC President Mohamed Bin-Hammam is to challenge Sepp Blatter for the Presidency of FIFA in June. “It seems he will challenge the FIFA presidential election in June," wrote the Korean who was unseated by a Blatter loyalist Prince Ali Bin Hussein of Jordan at the AFC Congress in Doha in January. Bin-Hammam recently said Blatter, in charge since 1998, had spent too long at FIFA - 35 years in total, and pinned the global complaints about the organisation onto the President's back: "Everybody is going to accuse us today as corrupted people, " he said, "because maybe people see Mr Blatter has stayed a long time in FIFA." Blatter's to-ing and fro-ing over the date of the 2022 World Cup , toying with the possibility of other Gulf nations co-hosting and his vocal backing of India and Australia for future tournaments have been judged to be political moves designed to split the Asian vote. Bin Hammam set himself on collision course with Blatter since the President backed Bahrain's Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa in his ultimately failed attempt at unseating him at the AFC Congress in 2009. The Qatari has until the 1st of April to formally announce his bid, but recent statements from both he and Blatter appear to confirm the inevitable. (c) Sean O'Conor & Soccerphile Tags World Cup Pens World Cup Posters Euro 2012 football

As if FIFA were not in enough hot water already over goal-line incidents. In an interview with Germany's Focus magazine , President Sepp Blatter made an extraordinary admission that football's governing body was considering abolishing draws and extra-time in World Cup finals matches. According to Blatter's admission, penalty shoot-outs could replace ties in the group games, while, mirabile dictu, the ' golden goal ' could make a return to the knock-out stages in order to spice up extra-time before another shoot-out, if necessary. What has prompted this sudden revelation of another p otential volte-face, following FIFA's u-turn on technology last week? Blatter is presumably reacting to the meagre 2.27 goals-per-game average from the 2010 World Cup , the second-lowest on record, narrowly beating Italia '90's 2.21 haul. The opening round of two games per group yielded only 1.6 goals on average, with nothing beyond Germany's 4-0 trouncing of Australia to write home about. The tournament was dull in footballing terms, with the exception of Germany's brief but fantastic foray to the semi-finals, which yielded a rich harvest of breakaway goals and sent the lumbering old battleships of England and Argentina spiraling to the bottom with aplomb. But a resoundingly negative final littered with b ookings, gamesmanship and brutal tackles put an unhappy seal on what should have been a carnival of football. At the climax of Sepp's big show, the watching world was left unhappy and even the winners Spain took their crown having netted fewer times (eight in seven games) than any previous champions. Blatter felt responsible. South Africa after all was the President's baby from the moment he first garnered African votes to win the top job in football with the promise of a World Cup hosting in return. Perhaps he is over-reacting to the bad impression the finals lef t on the field, or indeed looking to be a pro-active president as a re-election looms in 2011, although his throne looks safe. With UEFA increasingly strutting its stuff and steaming ahead with its own innovations such as the extra linesmen, FIFA does not want to be seen to be an ostrich with its head in the sand, and while it is reassuring that they are ope n to change and eager to improve the aesthetic experience of top-level soccer, this latest shock still begs two questions - if it ain't broke, why fix it and if it is broken, what can we do? We can all agree on the need for more attacking and entertaining football, though we surely do not want as much scoring as in basketball. Yet short of increasing the size of the goals to gargantuan proportions or reducing the number of players per side, can anything realistically be changed ? Is doing away with extra-time going to increase the amount of attacking play over 90 minutes? And will teams determined to play for spot-kicks anyway not welcome a half-hour less in which to have to run around? This has been tried before of course in many competitions. Abolishing draws in the NASL and later, MLS, was resoundingly unpopular with fans, players and coaches. Replacing the award of a hard-earned point with the lottery of penalties le ft honest teams unpaid for having clawed back a deficit, and superior sides equally penniless for having failed to break down a stubborn defence only to lose on spot-kicks. So it seems unthinkable that if American fans succeeded in binning the shoot-out after four miserable seasons, FIFA is all set to re-introduce it at the highest level. 'Golden goal' was another aberration best confined to the annals of past mistakes we have learnt from. Introduced as a compromised response to the dissatisfaction with the penalty shoot-outs of the 1990 and 1994 World Cups, golden goal, where the first goal in extra-time wins, debuted in Euro '96, when Oliver Bierhoff's 95th minute strike handed the trophy to Germany. Laurent Blanc sent France through to the last eight of the 1998 World Cup with a golden goal in Lens, while at Euro 2000 the French were again the beneficiaries with a Zinedine Zidane penalty in the semi-final and a David Trezeguet winner in the final. Three years later on home soil, Thierry Henry bagged another golden goal to win the Confederations Cup. The evidence of golden goal improving the contest as a whole was inconclusive. In fact, the spectacles of both the Euro '96 and Euro 2000 finals seemed to have been terminated prematurely by the rule, when it was the maximizing of entertainment which had lain behind its imposition in the first place. Its penultimate hurrah came in the 2002 World Cup, when Senegal and South Korea advanced to the last eight and Turkey to the last four on golden goals. When it was quietly abolished by FIFA's International Board (IFAB) in 2004, there were few mourners and since then there has been no clamour whatsoever to revive it. Nor has UEFA's short-lived silver goal of Euro 2004 (whoever leads after 15 minutes of extra-time wins) been sorely missed by anyone. No, if improving the spectacle is the aim, an already-failed experiment is not the means again. Blatter must be feeling the strain of South Africa to have plucked this comedy rabbit out of the hat so soon after the finals. Some time in the Swiss Alps or some R&R beside Lake Zurich might be just the ticket in order for him to regain his composure. As a German journalist immortally commented to Brian Glanville - "That man (Blatter) has 50 ideas a day, and 51 of them are bad." (c) Sean O'Conor & Soccerphile Tags World Cup Pens World Cup Posters World Cup football