Craig F̶o̶s̶t̶e̶r̶

One of the craziest elements of Gianni’s leadership. With his own management team often cut out, he has started sending former players (FIFA Legends) to big-time meetings with financial institutions. @TheAthleticFC

Uefa threatens Gianni Infantino and Joshua Kushner with legal action ‘European football’s governing body warns Fifa president not to destroy material relating to botched World Cup plot’ The right approach. telegraph.co.uk/football/2026/…

Very good question. And it applies to all those allied to, working with, and accepting the largesse and various payoffs of FIFA, who purport to somehow be guardians of the game. Many travel the world in style. Few ever stand up for the game that provides it for them.

The Cristiano decision days after their White House dinner, hydration breaks, the Trump peace prize, crazy ticket prices, the half-time show and then Balogun... How Infantino engineered the World Cup to sell his doomed plan. thetimes.com/sport/football…

The convenient idea that Infantino is the sole problem leaves the game vulnerable to further exploitation. Every stakeholder has played a part in where we have arrived. The question is, what now? Fans and players need to mobilise for real accountability — with leverage, not just statements. The goal must be stronger external safeguards, genuine transparency, and an organisational culture at FIFA that no longer enables this from the inside. More should be expected of the game’s legends. Too many allow themselves to be used as public tokens of credibility while remaining silent when it counts. And FIFPRO, the global players’ union, should be the strongest voice for structural reform. The players hold the real power. But they lack the organisation to mobilise it, and the authority to use it. A game that acts ethically, enforces accountability, grows equitably and protects its core assets is a long way off. This should be a lesson for everyone. Next time may be too late.

The plan is dead. For now. But capital wants a share of the World Cup, and they’ll be back. 
The real work starts now. This only got so far because too many stakeholders were compliant. Too gutless.
Everyone feeding from the trough, protecting their own slice, staying quiet while power concentrated and the game was commodified. We’ve had States using clubs for soft power, sportswashing galore, the gutting of the FIFA ethics committee and Human Rights Advisory Board, without a peep from the 211 member federations. Of course there’s no accountability, you voted for it. Saudi Arabia perverted the entire World Cup rotation system to get 2034. Not a word. Balogun fiasco - which goes to the essence of on field integrity - no investigation. ‘Peace Prize’? What a farce. There must be full accountability. 
A complete, independent investigation into how this plan was developed, who was involved, what discussions took place, and what conflicts of interest and improper influence were at play. And real governance reform. 
Power cannot continue to reside in one person or a closed circle. Infantino has been able to rule as emperor by using federation dividends to keep everyone quiet. And it almost worked. 
The rules have to change to avoid this scale of secrecy again. And the people who love this game must step up. 
Fan groups around the world need to come together. Not just in your own countries.
A real global body of supporters that can speak with one voice and refuse to be ignored. Real leverage. Players and players’ unions. It’s time to grow some courage. Stop waiting for permission. Get organised. Build real power in numbers. You’re not even at the table. 
Start pushing FIFA properly and defending the game you play. And to the legends of the game — the former players with a platform, those who work for FIFA, travel the world and sit in first class seats. 
You have a duty.
Not to keep filling your pockets while staying silent. Not to harvest the game for more and more fame and money. But to shape it for the future. 
To hold it accountable. 
To speak when it matters. This game does not belong to presidents, investors, or those who treat it as a personal empire. 
It belongs to the players who make it and the fans who live it. We just saw how close we came to losing part of it.
The only way we protect it now is to stop being compliant, hold every stakeholder accountable to their responsibility, and finally demand better. This plan is dead.
 The fight for the future of the game just began.

Get. Out. There’s no coming back from this for Infantino, nor anyone that supported him. The global football community needs reform of FIFA, safeguards for future, and systems to operate in the game’s best interests. And we need an investigation into conflicts of interest, corruption, political interference and infiltration of the organisation, and failures of integrity off-field, and on. This must be a beginning, not an end.

Infantino developed a plan to sell a permanent stake in the World Cup while deliberately excluding his own senior management. And scarily, almost succeeded. Key executives were kept in the dark. Process bypassed. Consultation absent. The organisation’s internal checks, if there are any, evidently failed. When the president can negotiate the privatisation of football’s key asset in secrecy, and only later face public contradiction from his own chief operating officer and a senior adviser, the institution has already ceased to function as a trustee. It’s a smorgasbord. Ripe for the picking. The only remaining question is whether the rest of the game, the players and fans who own it, or federations tasked with managing it, will continue to tolerate these existential risks and periodic embarrassments, or reform the institution to genuinely serve the game.

Calls for accountability against corruption, abuse of office, and a potential World Cup boycott to halt the plunder of FIFA’s assets is not a ‘coup’. The real coup is the plunder itself — carried out from inside the organisation. In the event it fails, these questions must now be answered with full transparency and independent scrutiny: •What concrete accountability mechanisms exist for the alleged abuse of the FIFA Presidency, the reported use of commercial-in-confidence information for private purposes, and the failure to act in the best long-term interests of the organisation and game; •Will a fully independent investigation be launched into the improper influence, personal ties, and conflicts of interest between FIFA President Gianni Infantino and US President Donald Trump, including any role these relationships played in the current privatisation proposal; •Will a transparent investigation be initiated into the Balogun disciplinary fiasco — specifically the extent of Trump’s influence, Infantino’s conflict of interest, and the Disciplinary Committee’s apparent failure to act independently; •Who authorised the secretive development of the FIFA Forward Enterprise proposal without prior consultation of the confederations and member associations, and what internal governance failures allowed a plan of this magnitude to be unilaterally developed; •What safeguards, if any, were put in place to prevent the commercialisation and partial privatisation of the World Cup from prioritising short-term financial extraction over the sport’s integrity, universality, and long-term stewardship; •How will FIFA address the clear perception that decisions of global sporting significance are being shaped by external political, private-investor and personal interests of the President rather than the membership that owns the game; •Will the FIFA Council, Ethics Committee, and Audit & Compliance bodies be required to publish full disclosures of any related-party transactions, lobbying contacts, or personal benefits linked to this initiative; •If the proposal is withdrawn or defeated, what binding structural reforms will be implemented to ensure no future FIFA leadership can again attempt to mortgage the World Cup’s commercial rights without full democratic oversight. These are not secondary concerns. They go to the heart of whether FIFA remains a sporting governing body or has become a vehicle for self- enrichment, and internal asset-stripping.

Attempts by FIFA to reframe a private initiative as democratic after the fact, have failed dismally. This goes far beyond a financial proposal. It concerns the integrity of FIFA’s decision-making, the independence of its disciplinary system, and whether the organisation still possesses any capacity to act as a custodian of the game. What is required is a full, independent investigation into the proposal, those involved, the flagrant conflicts of interest involved in the Balogun case now intimately connected to the proposed World Cup sell-off, and the complete absence of internal scrutiny before the plan was public. Until a proper investigation is completed and its findings published, no further steps on this proposal should be taken. And any Federation in agreement with this debacle and cover-up after the fact, is an impediment to the minimal, let alone the satisfactory, management of the game. An ambition we may have to abandon, it seems..

Much of the game has responded with considerable venom to what I’d characterise as a hostile takeover of World Cup rights - the game’s assets being leveraged to pressure its own members during a period where they are least informed, and therefore most vulnerable to damaging decisions. UEFA’s decision to boycott future World Cups is critical to stopping the decision occurring in the short term. All other Confederations should follow suit. Any Federation or Confederation willing to allow this to occur is irreparably broken, does not have the game’s best interests foremost in decision-making, and the fans should ensure that domestic reform occurs. If this Infantino stunt is even possible, the game clearly requires safeguards to protect its key assets, and to properly regulate the process of change Not only to pivot to a new President, and potentially a different group of vultures. Following the World Cup, and now this, players & fans particularly will need to consider what a purpose-built FIFA looks like. And unite to make it happen.

The Infantino plan is not a proposal. It’s robbery of the game’s Crown Jewels. Under duress, arbitrary time pressure, and without full knowledge of the game’s representatives. It should be the end of his Presidency, and the trigger for reform. theguardian.com/football/2026/…

Can’t disagree. “This is not a 'democratic decision', but governance by intimidation - an act of coercion unworthy of an institution entrusted with the stewardship of the global game." sports.yahoo.com/articles/uefa-…

The Gianni Infantino plan to exploit commercial rights to the World Cup is a coup organised from within, executed by stealth. And any Federation or President that supports this has no place representing the game. The future of the World Cup and the integrity of the game are not for sale — and they are certainly not to be stolen in a case of very common thievery.

Gianni Infantino has given FIFA’s 211 member associations 53 days: approve the partial sale of the World Cup’s commercial rights to private investors, or accept a sharp cut in the development funding most of them depend on. 53 days to decide the ownership in perpetuity and commercialisation of the world’s most loved tournament, now almost a century old. He developed the scheme in secret, and is forcing individual associations to decide months before the next Congress meets next March. No Congress debate. No Congress vote. No testing of the concept, financials, projections, people and organisations involved. Just a time-limited, financially punitive choice imposed on each member separately. Reports indicate a high-paid commissioner-style role at the new commercial entity could be created for him, potentially delivering a multi-million salary far beyond his current pay. He is using the organisation’s own assets as leverage against its members, while positioning himself to benefit personally from the structure he is racing to lock in. The President of FIFA exists to serve the organisation and every association equally. Not an external investment consortium. Not a selected group of compliant members. And not himself. This is not democracy. It is not governance. It is not leadership. It is coercion dressed as opportunity. He should be removed.

Further UEFA statement on FIFA plans: ⬇️

It will fall on the players, current and former, and fans around the world to protect their World Cup. For future generations. The game itself, not its craven managers, gatekeepers and profiteers, will need to collectivise. Without the players and fans, there is no World Cup. Nor a FIFA, for that matter. The real power does not lie in Zurich. It’s on the fields, and in the stands, of the world.

UEFA is accelerating efforts to hold an emergency meeting of its 55 member associations this week, sources told ESPN, to discuss plans, including a potential World Cup boycott, to oppose a FIFA proposal to raise $20 billion from a sale of equity to outside investors. spr.ly/6017BEI7nU

Football is being sold.

Infantino: “This is about the democratisation of football worldwide.” No. The commodification. The game already has a democratic Congress, with 211 equal votes. What’s proposed is the opposite of democratisation: up to 21 per cent of the entity holding the World Cup, media rights, sponsorship and ticketing, sold to private investors. The group is to be led by a firm founded by Joshua Kushner, brother of Donald Trump’s son-in-law. The plan was reportedly discussed with the Trump administration before it was announced. The Infantino–Trump relationship is no longer only political. It is now to be formalised in a commercial entity — permanently. The Trump orbit, inside the ownership of the World Cup.