Ceferin challenges FIFA leadership as Al-Khelaifi rules out presidential bid

UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin criticised FIFA’s leadership in an address to the European Football Clubs general assembly in Copenhagen on Tuesday, according to the Guardian. His speech challenged the handling of the failed FIFA Forward Enterprise project and other controversies, while EFC chair Nasser al-Khelaifi separately ruled himself out of a bid for the FIFA presidency.

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The Guardian’s Nick Ames reported that Ceferin did not name FIFA president Gianni Infantino during the address. Instead, he used Hans Christian Andersen’s story of The Emperor’s New Clothes to frame his criticism. He argued that describing decisions as development, democratisation or consultation did not resolve concerns about the underlying actions or the way they had been taken.

Addressing hundreds of club representatives, Ceferin asked how their boards would respond if a senior executive secretly negotiated away control of important club assets. He also criticised the creation of a peace prize for a political leader without board involvement. According to the Guardian, those remarks referred to the prize awarded to Donald Trump, while a further passage about political intervention in an on-field decision referred to last summer’s Folarin Balogun affair. These were criticisms advanced in Ceferin’s speech, not new findings announced at the meeting.

FIFA had already pushed back against UEFA earlier on Tuesday. The Guardian reported that FIFA accused the European governing body of spreading misinformation and attempting to influence its presidential election. FIFA also urged a US court to reject UEFA’s request for documents intended for use in a planned criminal complaint against Infantino. The competing statements came amid an escalating public dispute between the two governing bodies.

The election is scheduled for next March, with nominations due by 18 November, according to the report. Senior UEFA figures want an opponent to stand against Infantino. Al-Khelaifi, who had previously been discussed as a possible future contender, told reporters in Copenhagen that he had no interest or ambition in taking the FIFA role and did not consider himself the right person for it.

Al-Khelaifi instead set out a proposal to broaden club representation beyond Europe. In his own general assembly speech, he called for the creation of World Football Clubs, envisaging a representative organisation that would include clubs from other regions. He subsequently said the EFC would welcome the opportunity to help clubs outside Europe, presenting that expansion as a direction for his organisation rather than a personal move into FIFA.