By Andrew Warshaw
October 28 – Despite being currently suspended, FIFA president Sepp Blatter is still making sure his voice is heard, this time assuring Russia that there is no danger of them being stripped of hosting rights for the 2018 World Cup.
Swiss investigators are currently looking into the bidding process that led to the awarding of the 2018 and 2022 tournaments to Russia and Qatar respectively as part of its wider probe into corruption at Fifa.
However Blatter told Russian news agency TASS that there was no possibility that the hosts would lose out. “It’s ruled out,” he said. “Russia will not lose the World Cup.”
Blatter also revealed for the first time that there was an agreement in place for the 2018 World Cup to go to Russia even before the vote took place – with the 2022 tournament slated for the USA. The latter never happened, with Qatar romping home by a landslide. All because, claims Blatter, of a crucial turning point in the discussions.
“In 2010 we had a discussion of the World Cup and then we went to a double decision. For the World Cups it was agreed that we go to Russia because it’s never been in Russia, eastern Europe, and for 2022 we go back to America. And so we will have the World Cup in the two biggest political powers,” Blatter disclosed.
“And everything was good until the moment when (French president Nicolas) Sarkozy came in a meeting with the crown prince of Qatar, who is now the ruler of Qatar. And at a lunch afterwards with Mr Platini he said it would be good to go to Qatar. And this has changed all pattern.”
Blatter says four European votes in the FIFA executuve committee ended up going to Qatar instead of the USA. He didn’t say why but argued the whole corruption scandal would not have happened if executive committee members had stuck to the agreed plan.
“There was an election by secret ballot. Four votes from Europe went away from the USA and so the result was 14 to eight. If you put the four votes, it would have been 12 to 10 (for the US). If the USA was given the World Cup, we would only speak about the wonderful World Cup 2018 in Russia and we would not speak about any problems at FIFA.”
Asked about English criticism of Russia’s victory, Blatter replied: “Bad losers. In Great Britain they have made this beautiful game, they have introduced fair play. But there was only one vote going for England. They were eliminated in the first round. Nobody wanted to have England.”
And he returned to the offensive over the FIFA ethics committee’s decision to provisionally suspend himself, Platini and FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke, describing the judgements as “total nonsense”.
“This is not justice. I put these people into the office, where they are now in the ethics committee and they don’t even have the courage to listen to the secretary general, Platini or me. I called them for the principles of the human rights: before to be suspended or excluded from somewhere you have the right to answer and they have denied this. They made a summary investigation and three days later I was suspended.”
Maintaining his wrath against ethics investigators, Blatter continued: “I think it was the pressure of the media. It was the pressure to get rid of the FIFA president. Unfortunately, Platini was in the same boat. And they wanted to say: ‘We, the ethics Committee, are not at the service of the president, we are totally independent.’ This is wrong. They can be independent but they don’t need to be against me.”
Blatter’s ban has clearly not stopped him expressing his opinions and he also turned up the heat on Platini by suggesting UEFA had long wanted him out.
“For three years already, and specifically after the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, UEFA did not want me as the president. It was a conducted attack on the FIFA president,” said Blatter.
“At the beginning it was only a personal attack. It was Platini against me. But then it became political. It was no longer Platini against me but also those who lost the World Cup [vote]. The other confederations were with me. Only UEFA tried to force me out. They did not succeed. Even with this tsunami [the May arrests in Zurich] I was re-elected as president.”