Sepp Blatter has been re-elected as FIFA president.
The controversial presedential election went ahead yesterday despite protests by the English and Scottish FAs for it to be postponed.
The two associations wanted time to allow other candidates to stand after Blatter’s only rival, Qatar’s Mohamed Bin Hamman, withdrew at the weekend after allegations that he dished out about £30,000 in bribes.
Swiss Blatter, 75, was cleared of any wrong-doing by an ethics committee. The same committee earlier this week suspended Bin Hammam and Trinidad’s Jack Warner, a Fifa vice-present, over bribery allegations.
Both denied any wrongdoing, following allegations by US official Chuck Blazer. Bin Hammam has appealed but was denied entry into yesterday’s Fifa Congress in Zurich, where Blatter was backed by 186 out of 203 voting delegates.
The English FA was attacked by senior Fifa members for attempting to address the allegations relating to World Cup host nation bidding.
Argentinian Fifa vice-president Julio Grondona referred to England’s failed 2018 bid in an interview with a German press agency and called England “pirates” before adding: “With the English bid I said, ‘Let us be brief. If you give back the Falkland Islands, which belong to us, you will get my vote’. They then became sad and left.”
Following a week of crisis at Fifa, English FA chairman David Bernstein failed to convince the 208 member associations to stop Blatter being re-elected unopposed. But they voted by 172 votes to 17 not to postpone the election, with 17 nations declining to vote. It’s believed the FAI did not back the motion.
