Европын хөлбөмбөгийн холбоо (УЕФА) ФИФА-гийн тэмцээнүүдийг хувийн хэвшлийн хөрөнгө оруулагчдад худалдах төлөвлөгөөг эсэргүүцэж, цаашид зохион байгуулагдах Дэлхийн аварга шалгаруулах тэмцээнийг бойкотлохоо мэдэгдлээ.
ФИФА-гийн ерөнхийлөгч Жанни Инфантино “FIFA Forward Enterprise” хэмээх шинэ бүтцийг байгуулж, ДАШТ-ий арилжааны үйл ажиллагааны 21 хувийг хувийн хөрөнгө оруулагчдад 20 тэрбум ам.доллароор худалдах төлөвлөгөөг танилцуулсан нь ийнхүү ширүүн эсэргүүцэлтэй тулгарлаа. УЕФА-гийн гишүүн 55 холбоо уг саналыг хөлбөмбөгийн мөн чанар, засаглалд халдсан ноцтой үйлдэл гэж үзэж, Европын шигшээ багууд ФИФА-гийн ямар ч тэмцээнд оролцохгүй гэдгээ албан ёсоор мэдэгдэв.
Энэхүү бойкот нь ирэх есдүгээр сард Польшид болох эмэгтэйчүүдийн 20 хүртэлх насны ДАШТ-ээс эхлээд Бразилд болох эмэгтэйчүүдийн ДАШТ хүртэлх бүх тэмцээнд шууд нөлөөлөхөөр байна. Европын шигшээ багуудгүйгээр ДАШТ-ий чанар, арилжааны үнэ цэнэ эрс буурах нь тодорхой бөгөөд Жүүд Беллингхэм, Килиан Мбаппе, Айтана Бонмати зэрэг шилдэг тоглогчид тэмцээнийг өнжих эрсдэл үүсээд байна.
ФИФА-гийн энэхүү алхам нь байгууллагын доторх эрх мэдлийн хуваарилалт болон Жанни Инфантиногийн ирээдүйн сонгуульд ч сөргөөр нөлөөлж болзошгүй нөхцөл байдал үүсгэв. Хэрэв Европын холбоод нэгдмэл байр сууриа хадгалбал ФИФА-гийн дээрх төлөвлөгөө бүхэлдээ нурах магадлалтай байна.
Дэлгэрэнгүй эх сурвалжийг харах
Эх сурвалжийг нээх ↓
Is this the end of the World Cup as we know it?
On Thursday, European football’s governing body UEFA announced that its member nations are prepared to boycott future men’s and women’s World Cups.
The dramatic step was a response to plans set out by FIFA, the organisation which runs global football, to sell stakes in its tournaments to private investors.The dispute could have far-reaching consequences for players, fans and the powerbrokers involved.
Our writers explain what is going on and analyse what might happen next.
What exactly has happened and what was the initial proposal?
On Tuesday, it was revealed that FIFA wanted to set up a new private entity — called FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) — to manage the commercial operations of its showpiece events, including the World Cup.As part of the plans, FIFA announced it was looking to sell a 21 per cent minority stake in FFE to outside investors. FIFA said the company was valued at $20billion (£14.8bn) by global bank JPMorgan Chase.
Thrive Capital, the company founded by Joshua Kushner, the younger brother of U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, is expected to head up the proposed investor group.
To entice its 211 member associations, FIFA president Gianni Infantino said they would be in line to receive $40m in FIFA’s next four-year cycle if they backed his plans. He then gave them just 53 days to support the proposals — or miss out on the potential windfall.
For the plans to go through, however, FIFA needs a majority of its member associations and approval from the 37 members of the FIFA Council.
Coming just weeks after the conclusion of a World Cup dogged by controversy — including extortionate ticket prices, commercial breaks in each half dressed up as hydration breaks, President Trump intervening to overturn a red card for U.S. striker Folarin Balogun, and a surreal half-time show in the final — and following Infantino’s extraordinary Instagram meltdown, the proposals have only intensified criticism of FIFA and its boss.
Tom Burrows
FIFA President Gianni Infantino arrives at the World Cup final (Florencia Tan Jun/Getty Images)
Why is UEFA against it?
As soon as the plans became public on Tuesday, UEFA issued a swift and scathing response, saying they “cross a line that football’s governing institutions should never cross”.
It went on to say how “the soul and governance of football are not assets to trade — especially with zero transparency as to who gains financially. None of us are the owners of football. It is not FIFA’s to sell.”
UEFA and its 55 member associations later gathered for a virtual meeting on Thursday, with more than 40 associations speaking out against the proposals.They later put out an uncompromising new statement, saying no UEFA national teams would take part in any FIFA competition until the proposals were shelved.
“Some things are simply too important to sell,” it added. “The FIFA World Cup belongs to football. It always will. And so long as Europe has a voice, it will never be for sale.”
UEFA taking such a strong stance puts Infantino in a very sticky spot.
Tom Burrows
Are FIFA really trying to sell the World Cup? An expert explains
Chris Weatherspoon
Will other nations or confederations boycott?
There was a call between the 41 Concacaf nations scheduled for today. In a previous statement, it said, “Concacaf was only made aware of this matter through media reports and, subsequently, via a media release. We are deeply concerned by the lack of due process.”
The Asian confederation also said it was “disappointed that a matter of such significance entered the public domain before the AFC family had been afforded the opportunity to examine and discuss it through the appropriate and established governance channels”.
Meanwhile the African confederation has called for its member associations to “examine” the proposals in full.
Those who spoke out in favour of FIFA’s plans included Czech FA president David Trunda — although he later performed a screeching U-turn — and Erick Thohir, the president of Indonesia’s football association, who also owns Oxford United in England’s League One, a club who have just been placed under a transfer embargo.
Tom Burrows
Have nations boycotted a World Cup before?
Yes, but it’s very rare.
At the 1934 World Cup in Italy, defending champions Uruguay did not participate in protest at the low number of European teams who had travelled to the inaugural tournament they hosted four years earlier.
Uruguay again boycotted the 1938 World Cup, joining Argentina in protest after FIFA awarded the tournament to France rather than Argentina as hosts.
Meanwhile in 1966, no African nation took part in the World Cup hosted by England after they boycotted the qualifying competition in protest at FIFA allocating just one place between Africa, Asia and Oceania, compared to 10 for Europe.
Tom Burrows
What does this mean for the 2027 Women’s World Cup?
Readers might think next summer seems far enough away that surely it cannot be impacted, but the European qualifying play-offs for the Women’s World Cup take place in October. If UEFA plans to boycott the World Cup, those matches surely cannot take place, as they would be attempting to qualify for a tournament in which they would not plan to compete.
Those play-offs include reigning European champions England and 2019 finalists the Netherlands, as well as Wales, Italy, Sweden, Switzerland and Norway. Thirty-two teams in total would be impacted.
And if UEFA goes along with the boycott until next summer, it would mean reigning world champions Spain and reigning European champions England — both heavily fancied to lift the trophy next summer — would not be in attendance. In fact, six of the top 10 nations would not be in Brazil.
Megan Feringa
Spain’s players and coaching staff celebrate winning the Women’s World Cup in 2023 (Saeed Khan/AFP via Getty Images)
What FIFA tournaments are coming up?
Women’s football will be the most impacted by UEFA’s boycott in the coming months. Four of the next five FIFA competitions are in the women’s game, the first arriving as soon as September with the Women’s Under-20s World Cup, hosted by UEFA member Poland between September 5 and September 27.
The Women’s Under-17s World Cup, starting on October 17 and ending on November 8, is set to be held in Morocco while, on the men’s side, the Under-17s World Cup follows in November and will be hosted by Qatar.
The second iteration of the Women’s Champions Cup — a FIFA competition featuring the champion clubs from each of the six continental confederations, won by Arsenal in January — is due to take place in January 2027, with the first two matches to be played in the home stadium of a team involved in each match, and the final four games to be played in Miami, Florida.
And then it’s the big one: the Women’s World Cup in Brazil next summer.
But Poland hosting the first tournament to be impacted by the boycott is certainly gripping given they are members of UEFA and would require FIFA either to find a new host entirely or cancel the tournament, given the short notice involved.
Megan Feringa
How central have European teams been to World Cups?
No matter how you slice it, Europe has been the dominant force in men’s World Cup history.
European nations have won a record 13 of the 23 tournaments, including six of the past eight, and have provided most of the teams in the latter stages. This summer Argentina and Morocco were the only non-European quarter-finalists, in keeping with a historical pattern that has seen UEFA sides account for 69 per cent of teams at this stage and 71 per cent of semi-finalists.
While the United States have been the most successful side in the women’s tournament, winning four of its nine editions, Europe has rapidly caught up. Three UEFA sides have reached the past two finals, with Spain beating England to win the 2023 tournament.
Conor O’Neill
Which players would miss the next men’s and women’s World Cups if UEFA’s boycott goes ahead?
On the men’s side, a World Cup shorn of Kylian Mbappe, Lamine Yamal, Erling Haaland and Jude Bellingham would be a hollow shell of a tournament. Or, to put it in terms FIFA’s proposed investors might better understand, it would strip the competition of its most valuable assets.
German website Transfermarkt provides estimates of players’ values, and each of its 10 most valuable players hails from a European nation. Of the 104 players valued at €50million (£42.8m; $57.6m) or more, 77 play for UEFA sides. FIFA’s proposal aims to maximise the tournament’s commercial appeal, but without these star talents, the value of the enterprise would collapse.
Similarly, the women’s event would be lacking some truly stellar names. Aitana Bonmati, who has won the last three Ballons d’Or, would be absent, as would her Spain compatriot Alexia Putellas. England’s Leah Williamson, Lauren James and Alessia Russo, too.
In fact, the entire top 10 of last year’s Ballon d’Or Feminin (Bonmati, Mariona Caldentey, Russo, Putellas, Chloe Kelly, Patri Guijarro, Williamson, Ewa Pajor, Lucy Bronze and Hannah Hampton) would be unavailable for the tournament, not to mention exciting young talent in Norway’s Signe Gaupset or France’s Alice Sombath.
It would mean a World Cup without the world’s best, which is hardly what a World Cup should be.
Conor O’Neill and Megan Feringa
Kylian Mbappe would be one of the European stars who would be absent at a UEFA-less World Cup (Luke Hales/Getty Images)
How damaging will this be to FIFA’s plan?
Damaging? This destroys it. There is no FIFA Forward Enterprise without European nations taking part in its competitions.
Critics of Infantino’s plan were heartened by the initial negative response it received from the confederations in Asia, Europe and North and Central America, but were worried that the tone of those responses was more “why is this the first we are hearing of this idea”, as opposed to “this is a dreadful idea, just stop”.
And those concerns about the strength of the opposition to Infantino grew when the likes of the English, French and German federations all put out statements that were more focused on the process than the principle.
They need not have worried, though. Because we now know that UEFA and its member associations were just taking a few moments to find their backbones and clear their throats.
This is another European Super League moment. European football has correctly realised that this idea cannot be allowed to gain momentum. If Infantino could have dragged this through to his September 19 deadline, it would have been too late to stop it. He would have had two thirds of the planet, at least, on board.So, Europe has gone nuclear. We will not come to play. And without us, what have you really got to sell?
If this outbreak of unity lasts the weekend, FFE is OFF.
Matt Slater
How much less valuable would a World Cup be without UEFA’s nations?
A lot. FIFA is keen to talk up taking football to the world, and equally keen to keep expanding its showpiece, but it remains the case that European nations provide the bulk of the tournament’s quality and, thus, the World Cup’s appeal.
Six of this year’s eight quarter-finalists were UEFA nations, and since money is apparently the main thing football’s governing body pays attention to these days, a quick look at who took home the most in performance-based payments from the World Cup quite neatly highlights how crucial UEFA teams are to FIFA’s pièce de résistance.
After stripping out the $10million all 48 teams got for showing up this summer, and $2.5m in preparation fees, FIFA doled out $223m on a performance basis. UEFA’s 16 teams hoovered up $127m of that. Put another way: one-third of the teams took home nearly two-thirds of the performance-based payments.
A World Cup without those teams would be dramatically diminished.
Chris Weatherspoon
Does this mean European nations will pull out of hosting FIFA tournaments?
It absolutely should, right? You cannot with one breath say you are not going to play in the next World Cup but then, in the next, say, “We would still like to host one, though”.
No, if this boycott is to mean anything, it has to be a total boycott. FIFA, its sponsors and broadcasters, and its potential investors, need to know that Europe is off the table if Infantino presses on with FFE.
The funny thing is, some in the game thought it was incredibly unhelpful to UEFA’s cause that the German FA gave an interview to, ahem, The Athletic about its wish to host the 2038 or 2042 men’s tournament the day before Infantino announced this plan.
But then, in the German FA’s defence, it clearly did not know what Infantino had been plotting. After all, its boss only sits on the FIFA Council and those guys are the last people Infantino speaks to about his plans.
Matt Slater
Could this backfire on UEFA?
Yeah, sure, but only if the rebel alliance starts to fracture.
Europe may only have 55 of the 211 votes at FIFA but it has a far, far bigger share of FIFA’s commercial value because its nations have been providing the lion’s share of the teams, players and winners of FIFA’s competitions forever. Only South America has come close to Europe’s outsized impact and influence.
If Europe stays united on this, Europe wins this row. If some of UEFA’s members start to think they might like $40million to pay off their debts, build their own St George’s Park or hire Pep Guardiola, then Infantino can turn this around.
But everything we are hearing suggests European football really means it. They don’t like the process or the principle. And that mirrors what most European football fans think, too.
UEFA’s president Aleksander Ceferin (Richard Heathcote/Getty Images)
Might this view upset those parts of the world that really liked this idea? Those parts of the world that look at the European game with envy and frustration? Those parts of the world that find Europeans a bit preachy and selfish?
Yes, yes and yes. But that does not mean Europe is wrong in this regard. Putting any philosophical objections to “selling the World Cup” to one side, this is not a very good deal for global football. If it wants to go down this road, it could do a lot better.
Some in Europe will also point out that the rest of global football will continue to think Europe needs taking down a peg or two regardless of whether this deal goes through or not, so Europe might as well take the brickbats and be right.
Matt Slater
Does this endanger Infantino’s chances of re-election?
In almost any other business or walk of life, this would be a resignation matter. But Infantino deciding to fall on his sword would arguably be even more surprising than his attempt to sell a fifth of FIFA’s revenues to a group of investors led by Ivanka Trump’s brother-in-law.
Prior to this week’s Infantino brainwave, there seemed little to no chance that anyone would stand against him when the next election for a FIFA president takes place in Morocco in March.
That is not to say everyone loves him — they do not — but nobody believed anyone else would stand a chance in that election, so what was the point?
Is that still the case now? Let us see how he responds to UEFA’s surprisingly strident rejection of this idea.
FIFA president Gianni Infantino and U.S. President Donald Trump clasp the World Cup (Carl Recine/Getty Images)
If he shrugs and says, “OK, I’ve heard you, we won’t do it — it was just a consultation exercise, anyway”, he very probably survives. He has done this type of thing a few times before and bounced back every time, usually with a new idea.
It is entirely possible, for example, that he quickly admits defeat on this one but then quickly comes back and says, “Right, Europe, you didn’t like that idea but FIFA has got to even the playing-field somehow, so let’s have 64-team World Cups with more money and slots for Africa and Asia”. That would be very on brand.
But if he ploughs on with FFE, hoping that UEFA starts to crumble… well, it becomes a case of last-man standing: him or Aleksander Ceferin, and Ceferin has the better weapons at the moment.
That does not mean that Ceferin would be the most likely successor to Infantino, though. For the reasons outlined above, he is not that popular outside Europe and he has not hidden his disdain for FIFA politics very well.
This is why seasoned FIFA watchers believe Paris Saint-Germain president Nasser Al-Khelaifi, the Qatari boss of beIN Media and the president of European Football Clubs, is a far better shout as he spans Asia and Europe, as well as big clubs and media partners.
Matt Slater
