Nostradingus posted:

I fully intend to enjoy the gently caress out of this World Cup because there won't be joy again until at least 2026.

Hardflip posted:

Qatar World Cup: '$5m payments to officials' corruption claim

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/27652181

Fifa is facing fresh allegations of corruption over its controversial decision to award the 2022 World Cup to Qatar.

The Sunday Times has obtained millions of secret documents - emails, letters and bank transfers - which it alleges are proof that the disgraced Qatari football official Mohamed Bin Hammam made payments totalling $5m to football officials in return for their support for the Qatar bid.

vyelkin posted:

Blatter didn't want to hold the World Cup in Qatar anyway, apparently. So maybe he's just looking out for whoever bribed him more than the Qataris did.

Modus Trollens posted:

quote:

Qatar's foreign ministry said on Saturday, in its first comment on the case, that the men were arrested and "being interrogated for having violated the provisions of the laws of the state of Qatar," according to a statement carried by the official Qatar News Agency.

The statement said that all actions taken against the men are "consistent with the principles of human rights" outlined in the laws of Qatar, and that British embassy officials have visited them to check on their situation.

quote:

Sepp Blatter has confirmed he will stand for election for another term as Fifa president.

ukle posted:

The 2022 one kind of is, given Qatar is allegedly the biggest financial backer of IS.

Jermaine Dildoe posted:

Do you honestly think Blatter knows what twitter is? Those posts are made by a social media intern, probably making nothing but 'experience' instead of money

Badger of Basra posted:

4000 people have already died but they're not real people I guess.

CubanMissile posted:

Jack Warner selling everyone out.

quote:

FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke has said a men's World Cup could be played on artificial turf "sooner rather than later".

Valcke was responding to the criticism of FIFA's decision that means next year's women's World Cup in Canada will not be played on grass.

A number of leading women players have filed a legal challenge to the decision to play on third-generation synthetic pitches, and a major part of their argument is that men would not be expected to contest a World Cup on anything other than grass.

Valcke said FIFA understands that players want "the best conditions to perform well" but stressed any organiser of any of its tournaments is entitled to propose artificial turf.

The Frenchman insists FIFA would only accept pitches "of the highest quality", and added: "It could well be that sooner rather than later the men's World Cup will also be played on artificial pitches."

He told FIFA's website that Canada's decision to offer artificial pitches was "due to the extreme climate in the host country", a problem that looks set to also arise when the men's 2022 World Cup is played in Qatar.

...

FIFA president Sepp Blatter told German magazine Sport Bild the world governing body will listen to all pitch suggestions, saying men could play a World Cup on a synthetic surface "maybe even tomorrow".

Blatter said: "We are open to proposal from the local organisers, and this has been possible for years in accordance with the FIFA regulations. Artificial turf is the future of football."

quote:

Fifa vice president Prince Ali Bin Al Hussein of Jordan will stand for election in a bid to oust Sepp Blatter as leader of football’s scandal-hit world governing body.

The 39-year-old Prince Ali declared his intention on Tuesday to stand as a candidate in the Fifa presidential election on May 29 in Zurich, where Blatter has pledged to seek a fifth mandate at age 79.

“This was not an easy decision,” the prince said in a single-page statement in which he pledged to run a positive campaign and did not specifically mention Blatter. “It came after careful consideration and many discussions with respected Fifa colleagues over the last few months.”

“The message I heard, over and over, was that it is time for a change,” said Prince Ali, who has been encouraged to run by Uefa and its president Michel Platini.

quote:

The parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe has called on Fifa to rerun the vote to host the 2022 World Cup, claiming in a report that the original process was “radically flawed” due to bribery and corruption.

The report, following a series of hearings last year, claims that large sums of money that were paid to more than 30 African football officials by the Qatari former Fifa vice-president Mohammed bin Hammam helped secure the votes of the Confederation of African Football.

Before last summer’s World Cup, the Sunday Times published claims that Bin Hammam had distributed more than $5m in cash gifts, expenses and legal fees to officials. Qatar 2022 has “vehemently denied” wrongdoing and insisted the alleged payments were designed to build goodwill for Bin Hammam’s campaign to dethrone Sepp Blatter as Fifa president rather than win votes for its World Cup bid. It has claimed that Bin Hammam played no “official or unofficial role” in the bid.

But the report’s author, Michael Connarty, having examined the documents obtained by the Sunday Times, said he was convinced they provided evidence of corruption. “Given the structured action of this scale and the sums involved, there can be no doubt that there was a direct correlation between these flagrant irregularities and the outcome of the vote,” he said.

As well as examining the documents provided by the Sunday Times and questioning one of the journalists involved, Heidi Blake, the parliamentarians also heard from Fifa representatives.

Connarty said he had concluded “beyond all reasonable doubt” that the payments from Bin Hammam were designed to win the votes of the African members on the executive committee, thus allowing Qatar to eliminate two rival Asian bids – Australia and Japan/South Korea – in the early rounds of bidding.

“In these circumstances, Fifa cannot evade the obligation to hold a new vote under its new rules on the allocation of major events including the World Cup,” said the report. “The claim that Qatar does not have direct responsibility for Mr Bin Hammam’s dealings should not be allowed to validate a procedure so fundamentally undermined by illegality.”

quote:

Fifa has effectively admitted handing a lucrative World Cup television rights contract to Rupert Murdoch’s Fox network in order to head off the threat of legal action over the decision to move the Qatar 2022 tournament to winter.

Jérôme Valcke, the Fifa secretary general, said no rules had been broken in awarding the rights to the 2026 tournament to Fox and NBC-owned Telemundo in the US without a tender.

Fox had been among the most vocal critics of the decision to switch the 2022 tournament to November in order to avoid the country’s summer heat, because the new dates would clash with the NFL season and college sport. “We have done what we had to do in order to protect Fifa and the organisation of the World Cup,” Valcke said.

Fox paid $425m for the rights to the 2018 World Cup in Russia and the 2022 tournament in Qatar three years ago when Fifa was still insisting it would take place in the summer.

Pissflaps posted:

This is all so far removed from a bunch of a guys kicking a ball around a pitch jesus christ.

quote:

Sepp Blatter has warned that anyone who associates him with the recent scandal at Fifa “should go to jail” and insisted that “he will go to heaven one day”.

Fourteen senior executives of football’s governing body were charged with corruption on 27 May by prosecutors in the United States over bids for major tournaments dating back 24 years.

Blatter is due to relinquish his role as Fifa president at an extraordinary congress to be held between December and March. However, after speculation that he could yet remain in his role was dampened by Fifa, Blatter is adamant that he has not committed any crime and revealed that he has been relying on his string Christian faith to help him through the crisis.

“I have a clean conscience,” he said in an interview with German magazine Bunte.

“If somebody accuses me of being corrupt, I ask him whether he knows the meaning of that word. Whoever calls me corrupt will have to prove it, but nobody can prove that because I am not corrupt.

“I am open to correct or positive criticism. I can use that to reconsider if I need to change in the future. But if anybody calls me corrupt because Fifa is corrupt, I can only shake my head. Everybody who says something like that should go to jail.

Blatter added: “My faith has given me strength during the last week. I am a religious person and pray, too. I own a golden cross that has been blessed by Pope Francis. I believe I will go to heaven one day. But I believe there is no hell. I disagree with the pope on that.”

Blatter’s US lawyer confirmed on Tuesday that the 79-year-old will not attend the Women’s World Cup final in Canada this weekend “for personal reasons”.

quote:

The suspended Fifa president, Sepp Blatter, and the Uefa president, Michel Platini, will be invited to the 2018 World Cup in Russia, the Russian sports minister, Vitaly Mutko said.

Blatter and Platini, the two men at the top of the world’s most popular sport, were banned by the world governing body for eight years in December over a spate of corruption scandals on their watch that, among other things, raised questions about Russia’s right to host the tournament.

Mutko told Russia’s R-Sport news agency that Blatter and Platini were appealing against their bans and still permitted to attend football events.

“Formally, the suspension prohibits them from any position in football. But on the other hand, how is it that an outstanding player like Michel Platini can’t go to the football?” Mutko said. “We will invite them, I see no problems with the events we are hosting.”

The Russia president, Vladimir Putin, has called Blatter “a very respected person” who had done much for the development of the global game, fostered it as a form of cooperation between countries and was deserving of the Nobel Peace Prize.

Kurtofan posted:

trump getting antsy about qatar, maybe the cup will be cancelled if he invades

Kurtofan posted:

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2017/jun/08/saudi-arabia-footballers-ignore-minutes-silence-for-london-attack-victims

indeed

Tsaedje posted:

I was in Canada last year and a child called me homeslice

Zotix posted:

#CUM2026