By Andrew Warshaw
March 28 – Former three-time South American player of the year Elias Figueroa has confirmed he may challenge Sepp Blatter for the presidency of FIFA.
The 64-year-old Chilean is being trumpeted by a group calling itself ChangeFIFA, who are trying to drum up support for the former central defender ahead of the June 1 election in Zurich.
“This arose through a group in England and other parts of Europe who wanted to present someone as a candidate for FIFA, and they called me to join a committee which later decided I was the most suitable person as a candidate,” Figueroa told Reuters.
“I really didn’t want this to be known [yet] but the news came out.”
To officially stand for president, Figueroa must gain at least one official nomination from among FIFA’s 208 member federations.
Asian Football Confederation Mohamed Bin Hammam has already announced his challenge to Blatter while respected American journalist Grant Wahl is hoping to stand as “the people’s candidate”.
Figueroa, who played for Chile at three World Cups, said ChangeFIFA already had backing from at least one national federation but declined to say who it was.
“If I accept I know I’ll face a rather difficult scenario but nothing is impossible,” he said.
“I know very good things have been done in football but we also have some proposals.”
At the weekend, insideworldfootball revealed that two failed bidders for the 2018 and 2022 World Cup had been approached by ChangeFIFA who want to see an end the 13-year reign of Blatter.
Insideworldfootball learned that England and Australia, who only mustered three votes between them at the December ballot, were among the federations to have been contacted by the movement, but had both rejected the offer.
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