“Immeasurable damage”: FIFA ideas generate concern and horror in the IOC

“Immeasurable Damage”
FIFA ideas generate concern and horror in the IOC

Holding the World Cup every two years is one of FIFA President Gianni Infantino’s favorite ideas. The plans met with rejection and horror at the IOC. They endanger the sport as a whole, according to sources inside the Olympic circle.

The FIFA plans for a football World Cup every two years meet with clear rejection in the International Olympic Committee. During the 139th IOC session shortly before the start of the Winter Games in Beijing, several members of the Ring Circle called on the world football association to rethink. “This plan would create untold damage and endanger the sport as a whole,” said Mustapha Berraf, President of the Association of African National Olympic Committees.

World Wrestling Federation boss Nenad Lalovic and athletes’ representative Ryu Seung-min also criticized the FIFA proposals and called for more solidarity between football and the sports community. The change in the World Cup rhythm has been a major issue in football for months – the European Football Union UEFA and the South American Confederation Conmebol are against it. So far, the World Championships have been held every four years.

FIFA President Gianni Infantino is an IOC member himself. The Swiss canceled his participation in the IOC session in Beijing on Tuesday, said IOC boss Thomas Bach. Infantino had only come under criticism again last week because he had described a tighter World Cup rhythm as a possible aid against migration from Africa to the Council of Europe in Strasbourg.

“We must give hope to Africans”

“We have to involve the whole world. We can’t say to the rest of the world: Give us your money and your players – and watch on TV,” Infantino said after he had come up with his idea of ​​hosting the World Cup in a two-year rhythm instead of every four years – had come to speak. He continued: “We must give hope to Africans so that they no longer have to come across the Mediterranean to perhaps find a better life or, more likely, death at sea.” He thus constructed a connection that the more frequent staging of the World Cup means that fewer people decide to leave their homeland. The FIFA boss assured shortly afterwards that he had been misunderstood.

IOC President Bach warned that the discussion about FIFA’s plans should not be conducted in Infantino’s absence. He will therefore now forward the critical comments of the IOC members to the FIFA boss.

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