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Comments
I am the boss but I'm not accounable for what my staff do, even the senior executives who report directly to me. I never wondered why a very small, very hot country with no football history was the ideal place to hold the world cup finals. And because I couldn't see what was happening under my nose I'm obviously the ideal person to sort it all out.
What Womble said
Yep, Womble summed it up nicely.
I would add: Same person in charge for, what 17 years? What do people expect? Untouchable. Mafia boss.
When someone is so obviously bent and then he isn't marched right out of the front door it shows that the level of the conspiracy runs deep to the core of the organisation.
Some interesting comments on Question Time last night. Apparently Scotland are thinking of boycotting the next World Cup...again
There's a graphic doing the rounds on twit https://twitter.com/mckenziecnn/status/604168458050248705
which demonstrates the point quite nicely. No I can't work out how to do anything more clever from an ipad....
That is well put and the graphic is a real eye-opener. Everyone underneath Blatter is apparently as dodgy as a nine pound not but not him.
The extent of the denial and the absolute disregard for football itself is astonishing It's as if these guys really believe they own the game:
"The World Cup would go on even in the face of a boycott by Europe’s football federation, the head of Nigeria’s national association said today.
“A World Cup without , (Europe) it would be regrettable. But I assure you, it will go on,” said Amaju Pinnick, president of the Nigerian Football Association, as he backed Sepp Blatter to remain as the sport’s global chief while pocketing a fat, brown envelope."
OK I added that last bit but they must realise that without Europe (and probably America) there will be zero credibility for the tournament, few fans attending or watching on TV and sponsors pulling out left, right and centre. It can only be assumed they don't actually care.
Top crook in an organisation of crooks that, up until now, nobody has been able to do anything about. The man has the blood of every single worker that has died in Qatar on his hands and I wouldn't piss on him if he was on fire.
Think that covers my views!
Exactly scream. It might go on, but with nobody watching, there'd be no sponsorship money. It's only at that point - no money!! - that they might start to care.
I think even the journalists are finding all this so hard to believe they've abandoned all pretence of impartiality. Some of their Twitter comments are scathing.
Blatter reminds me of Ceausescu right before they shot him. He's got a friend in the nice Mr.Putin though.
I think that this is another case of the Americans using a smoke screen and Politics to do its dirty work. I'm not against the cleansing of FIFA, far from it. I think that the immorality of the amount of money involved in football would corrupt any living person, but I am less impressed with the obviously covert reasons for it suddenly becoming an issue worth dealing with.
I'm more disturbed by the deaths in Qatar building for the WC. 1200 people is it ?
FIFA should be held accountable for that - let alone the bribes.
Actually they do care. It's a fast growing sport in the US (the third most popular, apparently) and a few decades from now it won't just be the place where English players go to retire.
Potentially it's a huge market.
I certainly wouldn't count out self interest as part of the US motivation to step in here, but the fact is that many people have wanted to see the corrupt set of bastards at FIFA be hauled over the coals for many years. The allegations have been flying around for years and the award of the World Cup to Qatar was as good a confirmation of their veracity as you'd ever get. If it takes a nation that's disgruntled that Russia got the tournament in 2018 to sort it out then, I'll take that!
Apparently the vote for presidency is one country one vote. Which means The Faroes Islands gets the same one vote that Germany or Brazil gets. A bit like having a general election where London gets one vote and a village in Somerset gets one vote
What puzzles me is the US jurisdiction. Leaving aside the obvious and rampant corruption (I mean, Russia and Qatar, ffs), what business is it of the USA to arrest non-US citizens in a country that is not the USA? And who should have jurisdiction over international independent (in theory) organizations like FIFA, the IOC etc?
I'm thinking that at least Lance Armstrong will be quite chuffed that he's now lost his mantle as 'most corrupt person in sporting history'
It is not just the U.S though, Europe is right behind the Americans because it has much more to fear than the U.S
The fact that the 'neutral' Swiss are involved as the first euro nation speaks volumes. It is interesting that UK news is not really talking about the Russian connection. The spooks are obviously controlling the media coverage on this.
"The spooks are obviously controlling the media coverage on this."
I've got some tinfoil here, it would make a lovely hat for you
Great innit?
Muttley - as I understand it, it's down to the dodgy business that's been conducted in the USA. Presumably there will be tax avoidance issues there too. It's basically arresting foreign citizens for crimes committed in the US.
There's probably shitloads of other stuff that isn't even under their jurisdiction to investigate - hardly bears thinking about. Although the Swiss also have their own investigation.
It might sound plausible but it's not just the Russian bid that's being investigated but the Qatari one too.
Allegations are also emerging from a Congolese FIFA committee member about Germany buying votes from Oceania to host the 2006 World Cup.
This will probably end up entailing multiple investigations and could well be one of the biggest corruption scandals in history.
This is an investigation whic gets r
...and of course it's much easier to bribe a bunch of scrumpy drinking Wurzels
The Russian World Cup looked dodgy at the time, but the Qatari one just screamed corruption. There are simply no good reasons for having a world cup there.
Regarding jurisdictions, there are now UK authorities involved as the US investigation has turned up a number of dodgy transactions passing through accounts with British banks.
Wow - now the only comment FIFA is allowing on its own news feed is one which says, "Best wishes for the congress and the continuous success of football under FIFA."
I've honestly never seen anything quite like this before. This isn't even denial it's stark, raving madness. I bet Blatter believes that Elvis is living at FIFA HQ in an alien spacecraft with a vampire, a werewolf and a horse that talks.
Yep, SFO now involved.
I doubt if there's going to be a dignified exit from Blatter.
It's going to be like that UCI business where sheer weight of numbers just wears away at the status quo.
Eventually (hope springs eternal) a critical mass of significant nations will simply start to ignore the guy until he doesn't exist.
Anyway, at his age, how long has he got?
He's probably avoided the taxes but ..
🙂
It reminds me of George Galloway.
"Fiddling while Rome burns" is the phrase that springs to mind.
I bet even Nero was more popular than Sepp Blatter...