FIFA Meltdown - All Whites for WC 2026

Maradona, 54, is supporting Prince Ali bin Al-Hussein in the FIFA presidential election – which takes place on May 29.

The 1986 World Cup winner said it was time for change at FIFA, saying Blatter knew nothing.

"If I didn't believe that he [Prince Ali] would be a good president, I wouldn't be here," Maradona said on Monday.

"As the football world knows, inside FIFA there is total anarchy, where there is only one man [Blatter] who decides everything, but he knows absolutely nothing. Therefore it is time for a change.

"His colleagues should actually advise him to leave. He has done a lot of damage to football since he has been there. It's time for him to step aside and let those of us who are full of strength renovate football because football is becoming poorer and more corrupt."

Maradona accused Blatter of being money hungry, with uncertainty still persisting over the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.

"First, we didn't know where the World Cup was going to be held. Then we found out after Brazil it was Russia and then Qatar," Maradona said.

"Without any doubt whatsoever, Blatter is scared. He's scared of missing out on his share of the cake. That is what really annoys someone like me, who has played in four World Cups.

"I

I think it was Sky, might've been the beebs, wanted to do a live Fifa presidential candidate debate. Only candidate to deny was Sepp.

I know victory depends on rallying the nation's FA, but someone should run as the people's president and run on moving the Qatar WC. If anything just to stir people up and get nations to listen with their constituency as opposed to their potential pockets.

I note the Israeli's want a private meeting with Honest Sepp too.

The cynical part of me wonders if it would be cash, cheque or credit card. Maybe electronic transfer. If Splatter had any brains he would have declined a meeting like that.

I find the elections so disheartening. It's not like the opponents to Blatter are offering anything new for football. They just seem to want to extend the World Cup so they can get a few extra votes.

Blatter out. Will take anyone else.

Luis Figo quits FIFA presidential race

Basically we have to wait till sepp kicks the bucket to see changes.  That cannot come soon enough.

I'm no fan of Blatter but the problems at FIFA run far deeper.

One bad apple can ruin the rest of the bunch. I hope Blatter loses. 

Zurich hotel raid

https://twitter.com/hashtag/fifa

HUGE DEVELOPMENT! The United States Department of Justice has arrested FIFA officials in Switzerland for racketeering and money laundering, among other things.

Reading that to get the Swiss to co-operate the U.S. would've needed some pretty substantial evidence, which means they have it which is somewhat a good thing.

Part of me really hopes this is strategically timed to screw up these elections.

And we recorded the first two episodes of the podcast yesterday ffs

think this could now turn into a house of cards as everyone scrambles with Blatter being the last to fall

Arrest them all, start again.

watch this space I guess

More on this...

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/28/sports/soccer/fi...

Good summary here

Think this is just the start

FIFA press conference at 10am (9pm our time) delayed for 10 minutes

Just watched the FIFA press conference, They are claiming this is good for them, that the president and general secretary have nothing to do with it and that they actually instigated one of the investigations - The FIFA PR guy was definitely earning his salary there!

9 officials & 5 Corporate execs arrested

Jeffery Webb is the head of FIFA's internal audit committee!

Think this is just the start

This is only the tip of the iceberg. The whole FIFA process needs a good clean out. The way Quatar got the final needs to be looked at again.

The World Cup process is a disaster. Insisting on new stadia is a huge financial burden on the host countries. South Africa has stadia purposely built for the WC that sit empty....while down the road tens of thousands of people live in shanty towns. Ditto in Brazil.

The Russian WC will be the most expensive ever. 11.5 billion euros(close to 19 billion NZD approx) They are building 12 brand new stadia that will seat from 45,000 up to 80,000. First Division football in Russia average croud is 12,000.....this is madness

The whole FIFA model is broken. Time to start again. There is talk today in Europe of UEFA breaking away from FIFA and forming a new world body

Blazer and Warner eh. I wonder if the Oceania issues will resurface.

Re Oceania and specifically Charlie Dempsey, I saw this from a Football Central article last year. I don't remember it being reported on at the time in the NZ Media...

Andrew Jennings is well respected investigative journo involved in reporting corruption in FIFA and the IOC, and if you haven't already I thoroughly recommend reading his books.

Snippet of the story below, and the full article here - http://t.co/wN63hcydTT

Eastern Subs Trophy Cabinet.

Wonder who'll be the first major Fifa sponsor to pull the plug. I guess Visa.

'Launder your corporate kickbacks with us' - yeah right.

NB $US110,000,000 - the figure the FBI estimate was paid in bribes and kickbacks to secure next year's Fifa Copa America in the US.

Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko, who is also a Fifa Executive Committee member, says: "We've got nothing to hide."

Yeah right.

I wonder if this will be enough to get real change within FIFA, I doubt it. Interesting to see if Sepp gets dragged in any further than just allegations of his involvement or knowledge. I'd think he was pretty confident given the big names that have fallen before when they got into a position to mount a challenge against him. He is a very clever man it would seem. I wouldn't be surprised if he is untouchable  and all of these 'offenders' are people that have been trying to muscle in on his action and those of other untouchables in the organisation. apologies as I have just finished reading another conspiracy book on the assassination of JFK and am of that mindset at the moment :)

But it's still under Sepp's watch, he is the president, it's his responsibility that this rubbish doesn't happen - this will surely harm his chances of re-election. 

Could be true as supposedly they used leased PCs and all data/files from their bid are gone.

You'd think so, but AFC have just reinforced their support of him...

It does make me wonder when an acquaintance of mine close to the organisation says it's very bent but not a patch on the IOC...

He has support of AFC & CAF, unless the arrests start to fall in there he will just get away once again, not helpful when those nations govts/courts are pretty much as bad as the Football Ass. in the first place. I doubt anyone in those confeds has done business through USA.

Andy Martin has put out a press release this morning which says fudge all and lets watch some U20 footy in NZ. I'm looking forward to his justification of the NZ vote if the vote is held.

Sepp is to old and can't rule the footballing world forever. Karma

[quote=Jerzy Merino]

Eastern Subs Trophy Cabinet

Poor Old Charlie, He was put under " Intoollleeerrrrrable Pressure"

Loved this from The New Yorker.

Knew Plumb would be all over this.