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- [00:01]
Podcast Narrator/Advertiser
From globalization to innovation sustainability to market volatility, there's always more than one side to a story. Explore different perspectives on today's most important business and economic issues with the Flipside podcast from Barclays Investment Bank. Hear two research analysts in a lively debate and get insights from every angle to further inform your view. Listen to the Flipside on your favorite platform. Your team just added its 67th AI tool and also your 67th security blind spot. The good news? The Vanta agent works like a GRC engineer in the background, finding every app your team uses, scoring the risk and drafting fixes for you. Vanta is the platform used by over 16,000 fast moving companies like Ramp, Cursor and Harvey who are shaping the future with AI and staying ahead of AI risk. Get started@vanta.com.
- [00:57]
Manvi Morano
From the Times and the Sunday Times, this is the story. I'm Manvi Morano.
- [01:08]
Martin Ziegler
It was fairly top secret, this plan, so not very few people knew about it. Even within FIFA.
- [01:15]
Manvi Morano
It may seem hard to believe, but just two weeks ago hardly anyone knew about the plans that would turn the world of football upside down. Until one key meeting changed everything.
- [01:31]
Martin Ziegler
I met a good contact of mine at the start of last week and I saw a document which indicated what was happening and gave me a sort of good way in to start asking some questions around various sources.
- [01:47]
Manvi Morano
Martin Ziegler is chief sports reporter for the Times, and last week he landed the biggest scoop the sporting world has seen in years. Gianni Infantino's plan to sell off the World Cup.
- [02:04]
Martin Ziegler
I thought it was a very important story and a big story within the football world. I knew it was going to be very controversial. I probably wasn't quite expecting the enormous outcry it's generated. And I can understand why.
- [02:22]
News Reporter/Commentator
UEFA members have unanimously voted to boycott the World cup if FIFA's plans to sell stakes in the World cup proceed. This is war in world football. Europe, north and Central America's governing bodies for football in open rebellion against FIFA are after it emerged that FIFA's president, Gianni Infantino was hatching a secret plot to sell off stakes in future World Cups.
- [02:46]
Manvi Morano
Even world leaders waded in Football does
- [02:49]
News Reporter/Commentator
not belong to investors.
- [02:50]
Advertiser Voice
It belongs to the people who fill the stands, who stand on the touchlines week in, week out.
- [02:55]
News Reporter/Commentator
Rain or shine, the World cup is not a product.
- [02:58]
Advertiser Voice
It is the greatest competition in the
- [03:00]
Martin Ziegler
world and it was never anyone's to sell.
- [03:03]
Manvi Morano
The international outcry forced the head of FIFA to retreat. It's an astonishing, rather embarrassing u turn from Gianni Infantino. How Embarrassing, is it?
- [03:16]
News Reporter/Commentator
Let's be clear about this breaking news
- [03:18]
Manvi Morano
now because FIFA president Gianni Infantino says that he is scrapping plans to sell stakes in the World cup to private equity investors after days of mounting controversy as well as global backlash. Well, moments ago, Infantino. Since Martin broke the news of Infantino's plan last week, the FIFA president's once unassailable hold on power now seems to be crumbling.
- [03:48]
Martin Ziegler
The growing backlash against FIFA's private investment proposal has a new twist this morning. A senior adviser to President Gianni Infantino has quit.
- [03:56]
News Reporter/Commentator
UEFA has instigated the next move in its attempts to bring down the FIFA president. Letters of support for his re election are rapidly being withdrawn from across Europe.
- [04:07]
Martin Ziegler
This is a step too far. It's the straw that's broken the camel's back. Infantino has been kind of pushing and pushing and pushing, and everyone feels if this was a sort of normal company, he would have resigned already by now.
- [04:32]
Manvi Morano
So how did Infantino's plans unravel so quickly? And can FIFA redeem itself after yet another scandal? The story today, Infantino on the brink. Martin, the last time we spoke to you was just in the run up to the World cup when we did a profile on the podcast of Gianni Infantino, which feels rather prophetic in many ways now, but at the time you said that he would be running FIFA until 2031, there was no doubt about it. He'd managed to shore up enough support. And for anyone who hasn't heard it, do go back and have a listen to that profile. Here we are a week on from your big scoop and his position's looking a lot more precarious. How long do you think he can last? Now? What are you hearing from inside FIFA?
- [05:32]
Martin Ziegler
I mean, yeah, it's incredible, you know, the World cup finished. He's told the national association has made this Incredible amount of $15 billion in record revenues for a World cup, double the the amount of the last World Cup. So it just seemed he was impregnable and no one was going to stand against him in the election next March. He had already had 200 letters out of the 211 member associations backing him, including people like the English FA, took quite a major development. But it didn't take long for that all to change. And now he is absolutely precarious. And I think within football and lots of people who make up FIFA, there's a really strong push now to get rid of him.
- [06:24]
Manvi Morano
What's happening inside FIFA right now? I mean, he's very good at trying to shore up support, trying to build coalitions. Is any of that working? What is he doing?
- [06:32]
Martin Ziegler
I mean, he's had a handful of countries come out and support him. I've been actually amazed by how few have done. I think that my last count was only like 16 or so had actually issued statements. And some countries that you thought might be sort of nailed on to back him so far haven't done so. For example, Saudi Arabia, I mean that might change, but they haven't done so so far. And you're getting criticism from across the world. You're getting the Jordanian Football association saying that the pressure put on them previously to endorse him amounted to blackmail.
- [07:05]
News Reporter/Commentator
The president of the Jordan Football Association, Prince Ali, he was basically told that if you as the Jordanian fa, come out and support Johnny Infantino's bid to be re elected unopposed as FIFA president in March next year, then it would help your cause. And in his statement he said that amounts to blackmail.
- [07:29]
Martin Ziegler
So it's really, really strong stuff.
- [07:32]
Manvi Morano
And it there seems like there's almost sort of an alliance now trying to topple him. Give us a sense of the dynamics behind the scenes.
- [07:41]
Martin Ziegler
Yeah, so we've got the sort of UEFA, the 55 member nations from Europe, perhaps all of them very much anti Infantino. Now they threatened to boycott the World cup and said they would do unless he dropped the World cup selloff plan. And that actually led to its collapse. But then you've got this alliance between them, concacaf, which is the confederation which covers north and Central America and the Caribbean, something like 35 FIFA members there and 47 members from the Asian Football Confederation. Now Asia is not, perhaps not as united against Infantino as the other confederations, but the fact that the leaders there are part of the, perhaps we can call it a rebel alliance, I think that's really significant. And no wonder. Infantino's calling his loyal lieutenants and not so loyal lieutenants to a kind of summit meeting to try and see where he goes from there. Because I think he's under enormous pressure.
- [08:38]
Manvi Morano
Tell us about that summit meeting. What are you expecting that to consist of? Who will turn up?
- [08:43]
Martin Ziegler
Well, it's mainly kind of the FIFA staff. So like the FIFA civil service, effectively the paid executives, these aren't elected officials. So he's called them together to try and my understanding is to see where he goes from there. To me it seems smells a bit like a sort of last ditch attempt to try and cling onto power and see some sort of strategy. If there's any way of getting out of the predicament he's in?
- [09:08]
Manvi Morano
Does he have a call staff who are sort of banging the phones, trying to rustle up support for him? I mean, how is that, that whole process going?
- [09:16]
Martin Ziegler
He does. There's the kind of people who, in the sort of national associations or the member associations section of FIFA, are the ones who have been trying to do that. But even within his organization, within FIFA, he's got serious problems because the chief operating officer, Kevin Lamour, effectively number three in FIFA, he put out a really blistering statement last week.
- [09:42]
News Reporter/Commentator
So this is a statement from Kevin Lamour in which he said, my colleagues, some of whom have dedicated their lives to football, deserve better than contempt and intimidation. I know I have a duty of loyalty to my employer, but I also, and above all, have a duty of loyalty to certain values and to the upbringing I have received and a duty to support my colleagues. And if that means I lose my job, then so be it. And I will understand and respect that decision. At least I'll sleep well tonight.
- [10:15]
Martin Ziegler
So that hugely damaging his senior advisor, Carlos Cordeiro, former Goldman Sachs investment banker. If anyone knows about investing in sport and the value of it, he would know he was kept in the dark as well. He resigned last week. He said it's a bad deal for football, a bad deal for the member associations, a bad deal for the World Cup. And if he's saying that, a former investment banker, I mean, no wonder people are thinking what's been going on here. We've also had Arsene Wenger, who's the former arsenal manager, who's FIFA's head of global football development, perhaps the most famous face in the FIFA administration for many fans as well, indicating what his position is on this, this whole affair. He says this Wenger, the former Arsenal
- [11:00]
Advertiser Voice
manager, the decision to withdraw the project
- [11:02]
Martin Ziegler
was absolutely necessary and beyond question because
- [11:05]
Advertiser Voice
I firmly believe in an independent FIFA that serves our game with commitment, transparency and integrity.
- [11:11]
Martin Ziegler
And then even the Secretary general, Matas Grafstrom, did an internal staff email, which, which I've seen. So he's a kind of like the number two in FIFA. And he, he said this was a reproachable scheme. He didn't sort of name names, but if he's saying that and distancing himself from it, I really don't see where Infantino goes from here.
- [11:31]
Manvi Morano
What can they do? I mean, what can FIFA do next? What, what are their next steps? Can they have a vote of him? What would that look like?
- [11:39]
Martin Ziegler
So, yeah, I think you need 43 countries out of the 211 to have a caller emergency Congress and have a vote of no confidence. That's possible. You could have emergency FIFA council meeting, which is the 35 board members, and do the same there. I think the people who are ranged against him were just playing a bit of a waiting game, see what happens. I think they would just prefer him to resign without being sort of forced out.
- [12:05]
Manvi Morano
What happens if he refuses to step down?
- [12:07]
Martin Ziegler
Well, it will just play out as like a normal election cycle, I guess. They will select what they think is a sort of unifying candidate to run against him at the elections next March. But I think there will be problems there because there's this talk of like a so called governance boycott where the, the confederations and people who are against him won't take part in meetings, won't ratify decisions. So effectively FIFA struggles to work as an organization. So that's, that's another problem he's facing, becomes incredibly dysfunctional.
- [12:42]
Manvi Morano
We're hearing that he's been, you know, as part of his sort of attempt to shore up any kind of support, his team are not only ringing sort of famous footballers trying to get people to come out and support him, but even the White House.
- [12:54]
Martin Ziegler
Yeah. So FIFA said that there has been no attempt by Infantino to contact Trump or the White House, but there have been reports in American publications saying that has happened. So that's, that's not quite clear. But we do know that, you know, sources I've spoken to have said there's a group of former international players called FIFA legends who get paid to turn up to various FIFA functions and events. And my understanding is they've been contacted to people saying, will you come out and, and give a message of support to John Infantino? And so far no one's been prepared to put their heads above the parapet because clearly, you know, he's toxic at the moment. And do you really want to.
- [13:36]
Manvi Morano
Yeah.
- [13:37]
Martin Ziegler
Do you really want to nail your colors to that mast?
- [13:39]
Manvi Morano
Career suicide. Martin, stepping back to the original story, the reason Infantino is now in so much trouble, you broke the story. A brilliant scoop, global scoop really, about a week ago. When did it actually begin though? When were these plans first formed and how have they started to filter out?
- [14:11]
Martin Ziegler
So, I mean, the talks with Joshua Kushner, the brother of Donald Trump's son in law, Jared Kushner, the lead investor, and JP Morgan, that the bank was involved began at last year, so perhaps last September, October is my understandings of when they, it was first mooted this idea, but it was kept very secret. If you look now with the kind of benefit of hindsight, you can. All these things that Infantino announced and FIFA announced over the last year around the World cup, just to me as highlights that the plan was already taking shape. So, for example, Cristiano Ronaldo having a two match suspension lifted, which would allow him to take part in the first two opening two matches of the World Cup. That happened in November, a week after he and Infantino had had a dinner at the White House. A couple of weeks later, the Peace prize awarded to Donald Trump. Then the announcement that they're going to be hydration breaks at every World cup match, which should allow branding from commercial space, sponsors, obviously, the opportunity for TV companies to share advertising in those breaks. Another sponsorship deal with his big backers, the Saudi Public Investment Fund in May. Sky high ticket prices. Unnecessary sky high ticket prices. What was the point in trying to fleece fans so much? And then you get to the Baligan scandal with the striker who had his suspension lifted actually during the World cup to allow him to play for the usa. After Trump's phone call, I think the message here was Infantino was showing, I can make the best show commercially and we're going to have a long halftime show as well, which will break all FIFA's rules about the length of the time of the halftime break. But what we can do here, I'm showing potential investors forget the rules, the normal rules. We can do what is best commercially to bring the money in. And this is why you should invest with us. And that certainly didn't help when the actual revelation of the scheme came out. When I learned about it towards the end of the World cup, there had been a few sort of rumors about was something big going to happen, but nobody really knew what, what was planned, that's for sure.
- [16:33]
Manvi Morano
Wow. Do you, do you think he was, you know, on the margins of the World cup, having meetings, trying to persuade people to sign up to this great scheme?
- [16:40]
Martin Ziegler
Oh, he's definitely having talks with like Joshua Kushner about it and I'm sure other people in the White House because he had such close links there to try and, you know, get ready for this big announcement. I mean, there was some suggestions he was planning to do so on the, on the eve of the World cup final itself.
- [16:58]
Manvi Morano
Really this big scheme about selling, selling off the World cup would have come just before the final?
- [17:04]
Martin Ziegler
Well, that, yes, but he was sort of dissuaded of doing so. I think people thought probably quite rightly that was gonna, that would just absolutely, you know, cause us potentially overshadow the World cup itself, his big event. So he was dissuaded from doing that. And I think also he'd been a bit spooked by the, the controversy over, over the Baligan decision, so he'd taken decision to delay it. And, and I think they wanted to wait probably like another week or ten days before I actually managed, found out and managed to publish the story. I think basically it sort of forced them to, to come out and confirm it, you know, much earlier than they planned to do.
- [17:44]
News Reporter/Commentator
So.
- [17:52]
Manvi Morano
Coming up, how does this scandal compare pair with the many that have come before for FIFA and can they prevent it happening again? That's in just a moment.
- [18:18]
Optum Advertiser Voice
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- [18:48]
Podcast Narrator/Advertiser
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- [20:02]
Manvi Morano
Martin, you. You've just outlined a number of the scandals that Gianni and Pantino is sort of linked to the things that were already raising questions before this big plan was reported on by you. Do you think this, this final scheme, is it a bit like a Icarus moment? He's just sort of flown too close to the sun. He was getting away with all these, these gradual changes. For all the sort of controversy around them, he was still managing to get them pushed through then he just went a bit too far. Was he just emboldened by it, by all of this?
- [20:35]
Martin Ziegler
I think so. If you look sort of historically when he, soon after he took over he tried a kind of similar thing, but not with the World cup. Tried to do get private investment for a new club World cup tournament and a new global Nations League with Softbank, Japanese banks or underwritten by Saudi money. And Europe blocked that. At the time it was a kind of football politics story but it wasn't, it wasn't sort of huge news because it wasn't the World cup, it was talking about new tournaments. So he probably thought, you know, that was blocked but you know, I'll have another go perhaps. And then he tried to get the World cup to be held every two years instead of every four. That that failed. He's had a few things which he's not managed to achieve but it sort of not deterred him. And I think he thought, well, you know, I can keep going. And this time what I'm going to do is I'm going to offer financial incentives to my 211 member associations. Each of them will get $40 million over the next four years if they agree to the scheme or 75% less if they don't. He thought this is a good way of, you know, Europe won't be able to stand in my way this time because I'm going to have the majority of the rest of the world behind me. But unfortunately it didn't quite work out like that.
- [21:52]
Manvi Morano
And how much do you think the financial incentive was important for him personally? I mean how much did he stand to make if this scheme had gone through?
- [22:01]
Martin Ziegler
Well, we don't know if there would have been sort of bonuses that he would have got just from doing the private investment sell off. I think it's probably likely that they would have been significant. But sources were knowledge of the whole process and discussions and said that this new organization, FIFA, Ford Enterprises, that was going to handle the commercial interests of the, the World cup and other tournaments, that it was going to have a chief executive being paid $30 million a year, basic plus bonuses and that the idea was that Gianni Infantino would, when he stopped being FIFA president in 2031, that he would take that job. FIFA said that hasn't been discussed, that was never discussed. But my sources say that was indeed the plan.
- [22:49]
Manvi Morano
And he's a man who seems to appreciate the high life.
- [22:51]
Martin Ziegler
Well, he flies everywhere by private jet and he likes to be sort of treated like a world leader. So I wouldn't say he's, you know, particularly like, you know, what, likes, you know, yachts and things like that, but I think he likes mixing with world leaders, mixing with celebrities, feeling like he's a world leader. So he, when he went to the FIFA Congress in Vancouver in April, FIFA asked that he was given the same sort of police security measures normally reserved for people like the US President. So, you know, motorcades, red lights being stopped. So, you know, I think he, he clearly likes feeling like that. I think he is financially, he is motivated personally financially as well, that's for sure. So that's why I think he's clinging onto power so desperately, because without the FIFA presidency, what is he, what does he do? This is his life.
- [23:47]
Manvi Morano
And how important was the American president, you know, Trump and Kushner, the brother of his son in law, how important were they to the financial side of this proposition?
- [23:58]
Martin Ziegler
Well, obviously Joshua Kushner was hugely important. He was the lead investor. People said they had interest from investors across the world, but he was certainly the lead one. And clearly the links built up between Infantino and the sort of Trump network in the build up to the World cup have been hugely important to getting this idea sort of as far as he saw it, off the ground and ready to be launched.
- [24:27]
Manvi Morano
Martin, you've covered so many other big political footballing scandals over the years and you've broken quite a few of them too. But how does this compare? How does it compare to FIFA gate and the corruption or the stories around Russia and the World cup in Qatar and the Super League? I mean, for you, how does this scandal compare?
- [24:50]
Martin Ziegler
I think this is perhaps the one that has got the most global attention. The European Super League was a huge story, but a kind of European story. This is global and it's actually put the whole FIFA president's position in jeopardy. Perhaps, you know, similar to the 2015 corruption scandal around set blatter. But in a way this seems bigger because it's like the World cup which all fans feel that, you know, this is their tournament, it's part of them, they look forward to it every four years. And I think there's a sort of personal investment perhaps in this, in this story from the, the man and woman on the street that you haven't had with previous scandals and, and corruptions, scandals.
- [25:32]
Manvi Morano
Football is, you know, sort of a game for, for the Everyman, and yet it seems to attract more scandals than most sports. Why is that?
- [25:41]
Martin Ziegler
Well, I think it's because it's so popular. So if it's popular, then it attracts money. And if it attracts money, then it attracts people wanting to make money out of it. And if it attracts people that wants to make money out of it, you want, you're going to attract people who want to make money out of it illegitimately. So I think that's, that's it. And it's easy for many people who, their vote means a lot. So if you're somebody from a tiny country, your vote is as important as the vote of England or Germany or Brazil. And you're a tiny nation and you think, you know, I can use this, if not to enrich myself personally, but certainly to enrich my country's football association. And that's why there's this sort of system of patronage and power. And that's why a lot of people say, are thinking, but, you know, should we, should we change the way fever is, is run and, and led in the future? Do we have a sort of a rotation of the FIFA presidency? So we don't have one man or one woman in such a position of power.
- [26:42]
Manvi Morano
That might be one way of mitigating, you know, again, that kind of power concentration. Whoever does come in next after Infantino, though, will inherit many of his policies. You know, what are the big legacies he'll leave behind that you think will stick?
- [26:57]
Martin Ziegler
Well, I think he's, he was the person who brought Var, the sort of video refereeing and technology into, into football. He was very much a driver of that. And I think that door is closed now. There's no going back on that. And for a lot of people that's, that's been a very significant change to football, professional football and watching football. I think when we look back, that's probably going to be his biggest legacy as well as this sort of expansion of the World Cup. Now it's, it's a very sort of bloated competition, up from 32 to 48 teams. He's even talked about expanding it further to 64. So those are probably things that have been left behind. And of course he's, you know, his, it was he who delivered the World Cup, Saudi Arabia in 2034. And that's going to be another legacy of his.
- [27:48]
Manvi Morano
Do you think after a scandal this big that has literally got global attention, that has made everybody stop and look at FIFA again. Do you think there's any way that FIFA can try and redeem itself? What does it need to do in the future to try and change its reputation?
- [28:05]
Martin Ziegler
Well, obviously it needs a new leader. I think they need to a proper reform process. I mean, Infantino was meant to be the great reformer, but actually a lot of his reform proposals he never carried through and even overturned them. Looking at the sort of the structure and how it operates, I think it needs a proper, proper look at the whole process and the whole system and structure and just to try and make sure we're not talking about the same thing in eight years time.
- [28:49]
Manvi Morano
That was Martin Ziegler, chief sports reporter at the Times. There's likely to be lots more in this story coming in the next few days, so do keep an eye out for his reporting and if you have any questions on this or any other story we've covered, do email them in to the story the times.com the producers today were Harry Stott and Jennifer Kennedy. The executive producer was Edward Drummond, sound design was by Dave Creasy and theme composition was by Malicetto. Thanks so much for listening. We'll be back tomorrow.
- [29:37]
Podcast Narrator/Advertiser
Your team just added its 67th AI tool and also your 67th security blind spot. The good news? The Vanta Agent works like a GRC engineer in the background, finding every app your team uses, scoring the risk and drafting fixes for you. Vanta is the platform used by over 16,000 fast moving companies like Ramp Cursor and Harvey who are shaping the future with AI and staying ahead of AI risk. Get started@vanta.com Healthcare can feel complicated.
- [30:07]
Optum Advertiser Voice
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