The man who sold the World Cup

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0:30The New Statesman.

0:35In the middle of this year's World Cup, Donald Trump picked up the phone to Gianni Infantino. An American player had been sent off. Trump wasn't exactly sure why, but he thought it was unfair. The president thought he should be able to play in the US's next match. Within hours, the ban had been lifted. Something that had never happened at a World Cup before. That's as good a way as any into the story we're covering today, the extraordinary unravelling of Gianni Infantino's grip on world football. For 10 years, he's run FIFA more or less unchallenged, cosying up to Putin, the Saudis and above all Trump and turning the World Cup into the most commercially aggressive tournament the sport has ever seen.

1:17Then, a few weeks ago, it emerged he'd been secretly negotiating to sell a fifth of FIFA's business to outside investors for$20 billion. The plan collapsed within days under a revolt from football associations around the world. I'm Oli Dougmore and you're listening to The Exchange from the New Statesman. To make sense of the money, the favours and whether the most powerful man in football is actually on his way out, I'm joined by Zach Sweeney-Lynch, co-host of The Upshot.

1:47Zach, welcome to The Exchange. Thanks for having me. It's a pleasure. Happy to be here. Very excited to talk about Gianni and the latest scandal, controversy that has surrounded him and FIFA. But for some of our listeners who might never have given FIFA a second thought about what it is or what it does, can you explain it for us? Why is it such an important organization? Yeah, so FIFA is the international union of football federations. So every country has a national association. There are 211 of them and they form up the FIFA Congress. FIFA is the organization that runs international football.

2:32So they organize World Cups, they organize the Club World Cup and basically manage international football. Gianni Amfantino is the current president of FIFA. Underline current. Yeah. So he's been in charge since 2016 when he replaced a guy called Sepp Blatter, who had to resign amid widespread corruption charges. Basically, he'd run FIFA for a long time. There'd been widespread, I'd say endemic corruption at FIFA. It was so widespread that Set Blatter was giving press conferences and comedians were turning up and throwing large bundles of money into the air in front of them. It's that obvious.

3:20I don't know. FIFA, I think, has had a reputation for a long time as being a corrupt organisation. And it was even before Set Blatter took charge, that was the case. But it really ramped up during his reign. There was widespread vote rigging, basically bribery, open bribery, FIFA delegates. So they are the representatives of different member associations were being gifted Rolexes, being given brown envelopes of cash. There was an example of them arriving at a dinner and designer handbags had been left on their seats as gifts for their wives generally, because they were mostly male delegates at that point.

4:08Gianni Overtino took over in 2016 when Sepp Blatter was forced out amid these allegations and he's led FIFA since then. so it's been it's been a picture of transparency and good governance and organizational well-being ever since exactly exactly no it's just so the the slightly comical thing about it is that when jenny infantino was elected he campaigned on this platform as being the guy to clean up the swamp, essentially. He had enough distance from... He'd actually worked with UEFA before, the European Federation of National Associations, but he had enough distance that he wasn't embroiled in the corruption scandal.

4:58So, he came in and said that he was going to clean up the swamp. Initially, he seemed like he was doing that. To early FIFA conferences, he was traveling by EasyJet. He talked a good game, but very quickly it became clear that he was going to become embroiled in the sort of political machinations of global politics really and kind of combining that with the football world. I guess we'll get into this, right? But part of his campaign, because the position is elected, right? It kind of functions in this way where the Congress and the delegates choose who they support. And part of his initial pitch to global football federations is basically that there's this old guard, primarily in Europe, who control the game.

5:56and he is really quite explicit actually to federations that perhaps people wouldn't typically associate with being sort of like the titans of the sport, federations in Asia and Africa and places like that and says not only will we sort of turn on the taps for development money to build training facilities for your national team or whatever it is, but actually it's quite explicit in sort of saying, I want to help you kind of upset that old order. And so he builds this power base, which is going to be relevant as we start to talk about what's happened most recently. But for the purposes of that election, his power base is kind of in those smaller federations whose votes counts as much as one from Spain, England, etc.

6:44Yeah, exactly. So when he was elected in 2016, his final words to the FIFA delegates were, was FIFA's money is your money. A lot of the money in global football is concentrated in Europe, in those major countries. And there are lots of countries around the world where football is extremely underfunded. And also those countries are unlikely ever to qualify for a World Cup, a lot of them. So aren't going to experience the financial rewards of doing that. So suddenly having this new candidate up there who's suggesting that he's going to raise revenues and redistribute it, help to grow football around the world, it's quite an enticing prospect.

7:35Have we seen the reform that was promised, the draining of the swamp, the cleaning up of the sport? To what extent has that happened over the last decade or so? The most blatant forms of bribery, essentially, of FIFA delegates on the surface of it seem to have disappeared. There was no longer these brown envelopes of cash and Rolexes going to FIFA delegates. But I have the feeling that the sort of corruption of FIFA has elevated itself to a sort of state level. Well, Gianni Infantino behaves like a head of state. He attends peace talks alongside Trump's Board of Peace, attends the funerals of Middle Eastern sheikhs.

8:31And we should say, this World Cup just passed, generated, I think it was$15 billion in revenue for FIFA. clearly there are some not in quite the same way I don't think as perhaps other sort of entertainment products but nevertheless you are talking about thousands of tourists visiting these cities, the reputation of the Tartan army is still sort of lingering and kicking a bit of a stink in Boston you know there is a benefit to hosting these tournaments, massive benefit actually to hosting these tournaments isn't it and so you do kind of have this power that he can dispense every four years to whoever I wouldn't say the most worthy recipient but I'm not sure that's quite the right way to describe it right it is a gift he can give if we look to the past before America it was Qatar before that it was Russia Russia has changed was the quote I think he was talking about obviously Qatar we get the now iconic quotes you know today I feel gay today all the rest of it from Infantino it's kind of there's this like macro and micro level where i think the the the improper activity before whether it was russia hosting it like the the the allocation of the hosting of the tournament and then slowly there's also been this kind of creep actually into the game itself so uh the suspension the suspension of cristiano ronaldo suspension um from competition at the start of the tournament You know, overturning Balogun's red card, or at least suspending that so that the USA's star striker could participate in, was it the Round of 16 match?

10:18Yeah. Against Belgium. Donald Trump's personal request to Infantino. There's kind of these differing, the Peace Prize. There's all of these different instances. And I appreciate we're about to explain what the latest controversy is. But there's kind of a pattern of behavior there, which makes me think you can kind of, you can see how we've ended up where we've ended up because he's gotten away with it. But this is sort of what I mean, that he's acting like a head of state, but then without the sort of accountability that a head of state who's been democratically elected and has an accountability to its population, Infantino doesn't have that, which means that he has that freedom, basically, to do as he pleases.

11:09Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, well, let's talk about this plan then to, well, to allow private investors to buy parts of the World Cup. Can you explain it to us? For people who aren't plugged into football, the last week in the game has been really quite extraordinary in terms of what's happened. So walk us through it. Yeah. So last week on Tuesday, Gianni Infantino announced plans to, or a proposal to create a new commercial arm of FIFA called FIFA Forward Enterprise. This would basically be responsible for FIFA's commercial operations. So that's selling the broadcasting rights, sponsorships, advertising for World Cups, as well as being responsible for operating the events themselves.

11:56So managing tickets, hospitality, that sort of thing. That FIFA Forward Enterprise was then going to be put, part of it was going to be put up for sale to private investors. So chief among them were Thrive Capital, who are an American venture capital firm run by Joshua Kushner. Name rings a bell. It does. So Joshua, he's the younger brother of Jared Kushner, who, of course, is Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jenny Infantino's best mate, Donald Trump, that is. So the proposal was basically that Joshua Kushner's organization, his fund, would take a 20 % stake in FIFA's new commercial arm. So it basically means that a private organization is responsible for the commercial operations of FIFA.

12:58And, you know, I think at the World Cup just gone, we saw things like the ticketing scandal, the hydration or advertising breaks, whatever you want to call them. if an organisation that is primarily focused on maximising profits takes control of FIFA's commercial operations, it's going to be that on steroids. This is it, right? You can kind of chalk up some of those changes to Infantino's increased exposure to American turbo capitalism over the last couple of years. America hosted the Club World Cup before this summer when they hosted the actual World Cup. He spent a lot of time in contact with them.

13:37And so you can kind of see that aggressive commercialization. And as we've already mentioned, the kind of not just from advertising, but actually infringing upon the sporting component of the thing. And the second you have private investors, you're answerable to shareholders. And that is the way that the organization has to be run. And that inevitably becomes motivated by satisfying those people. So that's announced. And then there's this extraordinary pushback, isn't there? Yeah. The sort of large parts of the football world reacted absolutely uproar to it. So two days later, UEFA, the Federation of European Associations, announced that they will boycott the next World Cup if Infantino's plans go through.

14:28CONCACAF, who are the Caribbean, North American, Central American Union, they also reject the plans as to the Asian Football Federation. So very quickly, it becomes clear that this plan is pretty untenable. Also, I mean, the reaction from the media and football fans around the world at what feels like basically the sale of the soul of football, really. The World Cup is supposed to be the event that celebrates sport, celebrates football more than any other. It brings people from around the world together. And you see it at every World Cup, the fans coming together. It's a great sense of community.

15:17So the privatization of that feels like a real front to football fans. um so infantino basically had this situation where he he realized that his proposal was untenable really uh and on friday so it was only two or three three four days after the his his proposal was first announced he came out and said look guys that was that was just a proposal okay you know we were always going to put this to our member states member federations and you were going to have a vote on it look I can see that you don't want to do it so we're not going to go ahead can we just move on now it would be really good if we could all just forget about what just happened yeah can we just did that happen did that happen sorry I was a bit of a fever dream there and I mean in a way he's right it was just a proposal and there was a planned vote for FIFA's member associations.

16:23But I wouldn't say that vote was entirely without influence because part of the proposal was that member associations, FIFA has 211 of them around the world, the associations that backed Infantino's plan would receive$40 million over the next four years up to 2030. They would also receive a$20 million immediate payment if they agreed to his plans by the 19th of September. On the other side of it, if Federation C rejected his plans, would only receive$10 million over the next four years. Only 25 % of the total sum. So it's the journey of the organisation, as you've described it, from the kind of covert designer handbag left in the back of a chair to the explicit.

17:16And just because we dress something up and describe it as, you know, development funds that all of a sudden now it's permissible. Right. It's like it's become far more brazen and far more open. Yeah. Funnily enough, it kind of feels looking back at the old Setblatt era, it feels quite quaint. they'll rig a world cup draw for for a gold rolex it feels it in the context of this it feels quite quite harmless it's quite village cricket isn't it yeah yeah i know you don't have to do this properly let me show you yeah let me show you how it's done can you talk to me a little bit actually about that relationship with trump like how close are they actually recently they've been they've been spending a lot of time together they they would do because the world cup has been hosted in the US.

18:01The relationship, I think, goes back to 2018. That's the first example I can find of their meeting. Infantino traveled to the White House, met Donald Trump. It was sort of a build up to the World Cup meeting. At that meeting, he gave Trump a yellow and a red card and joked that he could use them on unruly journalists. So their relationship grew a lot closer after the Club World Cup that took place last summer, also hosted in the US.

18:41Around that time, FIFA opened an office in Trump Tower, which I've heard is completely empty. They haven't used They've been renting this office, which I'm sure Trump was very happy to be collecting the rent on that. They spent a lot of time together around the Club World Cup. Donald Trump appeared on the podium when Chelsea were lifting the trophy. And he even kept the Club World Cup trophy. So they began to develop this closer relationship, this friendship, it seems. Gianni Infantino popped up at the Middle East peace talks alongside Donald Trump and then, obviously most famously, invented the FIFA Peace Prize, which was then awarded to one Mr.

19:36Donald Trump, which, I don't know, it was a reaction to Donald Trump getting his knickers in a twist about not getting the Nobel Peace Prize. And I think Infantino clearly knows how to, it's a sort of, I'll scratch your back, you scratch mine situation. And he knows how to play to Trump's ego. And I mean, the cynical look at it now is this FIFA forward enterprise investment is coming from you know donald trump's son-in-law's brother it's all it's a murky a murky web it touches it that that family um sort of web is connected to so many of the different dealings and and the way the white house has conducted itself and i actually think that son-in-law jared kushner was involved in the initial efforts to bid for and secure the world cup and those negotiations if i'm if i'm not mistaken i suppose actually now cynically you might say that uh Infantino would quite like Trump to intervene on his behalf now as we're kind of seeing this push back against him.

20:47Although I read some reporting that Trump's not taking his calls. I read, which is slightly amusing. We're going to take a quick break. Stay with us. We'll be back after this.

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22:05The story gets broken. I think it was initially in the Times, wasn't it? And then all of this happens. I think a couple more of his inner circle resign as well, don't they? He eventually backs down. And there was a quote in that statement that you mentioned where he was like, nobody's selling football as he's literally trying to sell football to the brother of Donald Trump's son. It boggles the mind. His presidency is vulnerable now, isn't it? I mean, there's been a long standing rivalry between him and Seferin, the head of UEFA. And it's not surprising that UEFA came out and were the most punchy on this.

22:40But it's not without, it's within the realms of possibility, isn't it? That he will not be FIFA's president. Before all of this happened, it seemed pretty sewn up that he would get another term. That's looking really increasingly like it's in doubt now. Yeah. So I think at the time of recording, five European federations have come out and basically said that they've withdrawn their support for Infantino. It seems very likely that at the FIFA presidential elections next year, UEFA will not back him. Interestingly, about that FIFA presidential election next year, Infantino will be going for technically his fourth term.

23:22So he's been in charge since 2016. The FIFA constitution states that presidents can only have three terms. However, last year or the year before, Inventino announced that actually his first term didn't count because it only lasted about three and a half years because he took over when Sepp Blatter resigned. So we're just wiping that one. So he can stand for essentially a fourth term. He was given a sort of ceremonial gong by Vladimir Putin. It was like Order of the Friends of Russia or the Russian Federation or something like that after the tournament was hosted there. And it sort of smells a bit like that where it's like, yes, well, of course, you can only be president for two terms, but actually I'm now the prime minister.

24:09And it turns out the prime minister actually has all of these new powers now. And the reason I'm drawing that comparison is because in this initial deal for the new commercial entity that was going to sell these rights to the World Cup. It had a commissioner role, didn't it, attached to it? Yeah. So that was the other, maybe the most egregious part of the whole thing was that part of what came out in the Times investigation was that when Infantino finished his stint as FIFA president, whenever that was, he would then take on a role as commissioner, chief executive of FIFA Forward Enterprise, this new commercial arm that he'd created.

24:51He'd earned himself a nice salary of$30 million a year there before bonuses, which, you know, I mean, he's decently enough reimbursed as it is. He gets a salary of$6 million now at FIFA. I've been reading in the Athletics reporting recently that as he spent more time in America, He's become more and more obsessed with how well remunerated the commissioners of American sports leagues are. I think Goodell, the NFL commissioner, is paid several times over what Infantino currently makes. And there's a quote during the rounds, Infantino telling an associate quote, after 2031, we can make a serious amount of money here.

25:33And when asked if that$6 million salary you mentioned wasn't enough, he replied, no, I'm talking a serious amount. it's it's I keep coming back to this thing about how he's kind of he's kind of like he's been polluted by American corporate culture by the kind of turbo capitalism that exists there but it really does seem like if you consider the audience that the NFL has which don't get me wrong is massive but it's not the same scale as the World Cup it's not in the multiple billions And I think Infantino is looking at this entertainment product, as he would call it, and then looking at his salary that's attached to it and thinking there's an imbalance there.

26:19Yeah, I mean, I think the sort of blazers of European sport have been quite fascinated by the financial model of American sport for a long time because there clearly is, there's so much money in it. And Infantino has clearly been sort of intoxicated by the prospect of it. But we also saw it with the proposal for the European Super League a few years back. Remember that? That was in 2021 when a breakaway league was proposed that comprised of 20 of European football's top clubs. And basically, they'd leave the Premier League or the Spanish League, the German League. And this was backed by JP Morgan, who were also advisors on Infantino's latest proposal.

27:07And the model for that league was basically, it was modeled on American sports franchises. So a league that has a set number of teams, there's no relegation. And those teams are set on their position in that league, which as an investor is a much safer prospect than investing in a Premier League club who could get relegated and lose all of the money that comes with that. You're talking to a Birmingham City fan who my club was owned by. Well, we weren't really sure actually about Carson Young's personal net wealth. And neither, as it turns out, were the Hong Kong authorities because he owned our club up until he was charged with money laundering and disappeared into the justice system there.

27:57And then we were then bought by an American private equity investor, billionaire, with a minority stake held by Mr. America, Tom Brady. and I find it really interesting. Maybe this is actually what we should talk about now is this kind of, I think it's really easy to say, to like almost make this all about Infantino and to make it all about FIFA. And like, yeah, to me, it's really obvious. Like he's lost his credibility. I enjoyed the football at this tournament up until about the 60th minute of a semifinal. And then thereafter, I started to really, really dislike it. Up until actually, up until the extra time in the final when Enzo Fernandes got sent off.

28:48And all of a sudden it just really started to look like, like Charlotte, justice. But I love watching the tournament, right? Ran well. Immatino's lost credibility. He should go. The commercialisation has been so aggressive, so over the top. He's commodified this thing. But, but, but, but, but. I think we are kidding ourselves if we say that it's a thing that's unique to him and unique to FIFA as an organisation. And I really think, actually, as we're sat here in London, as English people talking about this, this story starts with the Premier League. You know, the advent of the Premier League, it's kind of the way it was, it's from its outset tied to the economics of satellite television and sports betting, actually.

29:33You know, the influx of foreign ownership, actually, particularly American capital now. All of these things, they aren't trends that start with the World Cup. I don't think we can absolve ourselves in that way. Like, football as a sport is obsessed with money. And it's not something that's unique to Infantino or FIFA in and of itself. Yeah. And I mean, you can see why FIFA's member associations in countries where football is much less developed would be accusing European federations who are now opposing these plans of hypocrisy. Because, you know, we've enjoyed the benefits of the rampant commercialization of football for decades, really, and have been able to grow our game as a result of that.

30:22and is opposing Infantino's plan to bring more money into the game and, if you believe what he says, redistribute it to those federations. Are we denying them what we have reaved the benefits of for decades? That's the argument. And, I mean, in defence of his model, not the enactment of it, I think, this world cup as you mentioned it was the most commercially successful ever the the profits were dwarfed anything by any world any world cups previously so when you look back on infantino's promise when he was first elected in in 2016 that he was going to you know bring in more money and redistribute it to to the federations you could argue that he has delivered on that yeah no he has he has and I just I really do think particularly from the European leagues and there has to be that level of introspection and I also wonder I saw a fair bit of kind of hand wringing and you know the fact that it was UEFA who stood up to him initially you know I don't you've got to be clear eyed about like you know people refer to the Champions League as the Gazprom for years right because that was a long running title sponsor and it was only after the most recent Russian invasion of Ukraine that they eventually ended that that sponsorship deal right it lasted for 10 years so it's like it'd been long running since the previous one in 2014 as well like there's stop talking about the splinter in my eye and ignoring the plank of wood in your own is kind of how I feel about it and I think Infantino's position is probably untenable I think he should go but we have to reckon with the fact that the sport is commercialised.

32:13It swims in money and it's not just a him problem, right? It's not just a him problem. How do you think this plays out? Where do you see it going, Zach? How does it end? I think Infantino is too proud to resign. I think he'll cling on to power. I think there will be definitely alternative candidates put up for the next FIFA presidential election. It seemed before that Infantino would most likely run unopposed, but this seems to have been the final straw for at least UEFA. How that election goes, I think is very difficult to predict because Infantino does still have a lot of support from federations, particularly in Africa and South America and Asia as well.

33:08so I don't know I mean I I hope that he goes do I believe that will happen I'm not I'm not sure that's kind of kind of where I where I fall down on it as well is you sort of sort of being like well yeah obviously he should go I don't think he will you know he should he should go it'd be better if he did I think I think we can we'll leave it there any final words I mean do you want to your sort of goodbye message to Mr. Infantino if this is the end of him. I mean, how will you think about his time as FIFA president? I think listeners will probably have a view of listening to our conversation about what you think about it, but just be really explicit about it.

33:49You know, what sort of person is he and what does it mean that he's potentially going, this is going to be his last time as FIFA president? We've only touched on certain parts of it, but the sort of deals, the big money deals that he's made for broadcasting rights for World Cup, Club World Cup. They are sums of money that enormously enrich states. So I think the legacy that he will leave, I think, is having turned FIFA into this sort of almost state-like organization that wields a lot more power than it ever was intended to. You look back to the founding principles of FIFA. It was just a body for the different national federations to come together and organise tournaments, essentially, and manage the growth of the game.

34:44It's now, you know, if he'd had his way, it's inviting, you know, a level of commercialisation into football that is unfathomable, really. It's really, you know what, actually, you saying that then just made me think about it, which is that you're right. It used to be this governing body, right? That is what it was. Over the course of our conversation, we've laid out that it's become much more than that. And in a way, his proposal was actually just making explicit what's already happened. So maybe actually we should think about Gianni Infantino in a new light. One more term. Zach Sweeney-Lynch, thank you so much for giving us your time.

35:34I've really enjoyed the conversation. Thanks a lot. Me too. You've been listening to The Exchange from The New Statesman with me, Oli Dougmore, and my guest, Zach Sweeney-Lynch. The podcast will be back next week.

35:59works like a GRC engineer in the background, finding every app your team uses, scoring the risk, and drafting fixes for you. Vanta is the platform used by over 16 ,000 fast-moving companies like Ramp, Cursor, and Harvey, who are shaping the future with AI and staying ahead of AI risk. Get started at Vanta.com.