48 team world cup and 32 team world club cup. It's just blatant television money milking.
Are FIFA the most blatantly corrupt organisation in sport?
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Should make it 64 teams, with round of 32 knockout stage. Easier to set up.
16 from Europe, 16 from Africa, 16 from Asia, 10 from South America, 6 from CONCACAF. Sorted.
16 from Europe, 16 from Africa, 16 from Asia, 10 from South America, 6 from CONCACAF. Sorted.
When you think of CIO (the olympic committee) and their emanations, of FIFA and UEFA, of the EU parliament besieged by lobbies of any kind, of the EPL opening doors to any “fit-and-proper” megarich entity bringing in the dosh for the movers… you can understand it is just enormous sportwashing, money laundering and geopolitics going on, with us the plebs cheering as fools behind one or another flag.
You forgot Oceania. Not sorted.
You'll be added to Asia, don't worry.
The super league seems like a good idea now
FIFA had recently banned the Indian football federation for "undue influence by third parties"
I don't mind the WC idea. Sure it's another way to make money but it's more football for fans at the end of the day. The biggest issue is players not getting enough rest, but clubs can always utilize their squads better.
We're long past the point where more football meant better football.
A lot of good players don't get enough regular football, and clubs can utilize their squads better. We're seeing incredible inflation in transfer fees and players salaries and the money has to come from somewhere.
It's got to be up there. It's so bad that even the ex president who was as corrupt as they come has called out the current FIFA
There is nothing wrong with football itself. But the people who govern, manage and market it are squandering the unrestricted joy of it.
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That might have been the case a few years back but not anymore, baseball, for example, has a pretty strict set of rules and penalties, and it doesn't matter who you are, not just doping either, domestic violence is another they have really cracked down on and the penalities for that are pretty much the same as for doping.
If the clubs start sending C teams and U21 teams to this, then FIFA will come up with some other way to stop that from happening. The players already have too many games to play.
There needs to be serious pressure for Infantino to go - immediately.
The guy’s completely out of control.
Let this moron carry on with this stuff and he’s going to genuinely wreck football.
The guy’s completely out of control.
Let this moron carry on with this stuff and he’s going to genuinely wreck football.
Let’s end qualification. Let’s end group stage. Make it a winner takes all knockout. Every country.
It comes from the realization that tired players don't perform as well, the general standard of football has improved massively over the last 20-30 years, part of the reason for that is that is that most players don't play every game like they used to.
Go back 30 years and barring injuries, you could pretty much predict what United's team would be, not so much these days, the overall quality of the football is better as well
Yes nothing more nothing less. More than enough games already for players
If we were to be in it, just send under 21 squad. Pointless and nonsens competition. Stupidity.
22 years ago as a young journalist I spent the night in the hotel in Zurich where all the delegates were the night before the 2006 World Cup announcement. The amount of corruption was staggering even then. I can't begin to imagine what it's like now. There's a reason they are in Switzerland - it's easier to access their numbered bank accounts with cash deposits.
Grass
I'd argue that's got a lot more to do with improved understanding of physical conditioning in general, especially when it comes to things like diet. You only have to go back to the late 90s for when what a footballer ate and how they looked after themselves was barely even a thing and it was normal to go on piss ups between games. Even now you can easily tell the difference between a well conditioned player and one who isn't (e.g. Rooney/Ronaldo).
Plenty of examples as well of players who can play without rest and their performance isn't adversely affected.
Its a shame they are doing this. I dont think they understand that part of the beauty of the WC was the qualification process and that qualifying meant something. 48 teams and it loses that allure. Now with a club world cup they dilute the existing competitions even more. Wankers. I remember when the IOC was the corrupt sporting body we all pushed back against, now its our own sport.
Always
Come on then, spill the beans.
And who exactly should or better said could put up the pressure on him? Uefa?
1. They are more or less the same corrupt association.
2. Infantino doesn't care about european votes. As long as he has bought all the smaller corrupt football associations around the world, he will always get their votes to stay in power.
The only way is for the biggest teams and nations to leave those associations, so they lose their tv money and power. But that will never happen. Some european teams wanted to leave Uefa, but they did it very poorly and Uefa could successfully divert the public story from "top teams want to leave the useless, corrupt money grabbing intermediary" to "top teams killing football, go on the street and save it (and us with it)".
Let's face it. The football we know will end. Tournaments and competitions will become meaningless, because we will jump from event to event without any pauses. The locations will be sold to the highest bidder and the cost for tv subscriptions will rise and rise.
Put it this way people don't normally arrive at hotels with empty suitcases and leave with them full.
I would personally like to see UEFA take control of the World Cup. All the best players play in Europe anyway. They could just quit FIFA and launch their own competition. The World Cup would always be in Europe and FIFA would collapse.
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Your second point is pretty accurate. As it stands, Infantino is practically untouchable. He is well liked for.. various reasons. But what did everyone expect when he was named as the head after serving under a previous corrupt regime.
FIFA is the most corrupt organizations in sport, but only because they're giving it to Qatar. All this time they're ok because the Western got what they paid for?
cheers for reminding us of being complete tools once again in front of over billion viewers
UCI are worse, they have enabled doping to the extent it is now impossible to remove it from pro cycling and even more impossible to know whether any stage race result is legitimate. Lance Armstrong, Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome went from men who could barely climb mountains to magically winning the Tour De France when they were on the corporate team with the most influence.
Giving it to Qatar is obviously their biggest feat of corruption yet, but you must have been living under a rock to not notice fifa being exposed and investigated multiple times before this.
Yeah no, the stench of corruption at FIFA goes back to Havelange in the 70s and possibly further.
This is one of the most disgusting posts I’ve seen for a long time. Yes the World Cup should always be in Europe, controlled by Europe, because the world revolves around europe. It’s like the age of the colonies all over again.
If you ask people outside Europe, the 1966 WC is still largely considered one of the most corrupt WC ever. Africa boycotted that competition because English ruled FIFA would not take action against Apartheid South Africa and would not give Africa a qualification spot (the only time an entire continent boycotted the WC)...
Of course, all the South American teams consider that German and English referees were on a mission to kick them out as soon as possible... Pelé got battered, with no yellow cards shown. It was open season on Pélé. England's Nobby Stiles got away with career ending tackles, while the Argentine captain (in the 1/4s against England) was sent off for talking to the referee...
Better than the taking it to brutal middle east dictatorships (or even Russia) because FIFA delegates are so corrupt and easily bought. If you think my post was disgusting you should take a closer look at the Qatar World Cup and see something that's an actual obscenity. What's obscene is building pointless stadiums for the ego gratification of dictators.
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I didn’t know the English controlled FIFA in 66?
I also thought that African countries boycotted because they could only have a max of one place in the tournament… the bulk going to Europe?
Football revolves around Europe, like it or not. Pretty much all countries good at football have the vast majority of players playing in Europe.
UEFA is also very corrupt but somewhat less so because
(a) European countries tend to have less overtly corrupt political cultures
(b) UEFA is answerable to the big European clubs who won't tolerate huge levels of corruption before they dump UEFA and form a super league (which is what many of them want anyway.)
(c) UEFA officials can be brought to book in the courts in their home countries or Switzerland.
Basically it's the difference between the still very questionable activities of Michel Platini and the out and out corruption of Jack Warner.
There were two issues at play. The first was that the European FIFA was hesitant to take action against Apartheid South Africa due to concerns about upsetting their governments (who were still allied to the Apartheid regime), according to the African narrative. The second issue was with the qualification system for the tournament.
After the death of Fifa's English president Drewry in 1961, it was expected that his successor would be English as well... Sir S. Rous was eventually voted and he played a role in selecting the referees for the tournament, including those who tolerated Nobby Stiles ending an opponent's tournament while also unfairly sending off South American players.
It was reported that FIFA asked the English team to drop Nobby Stiles for future games to avoid controversy, but Sir Alf Ramsey declined this request. Clearly FIFA didn't dare do anything about it...