UEFA harshly criticizes Infantino, despite his about-face on his controversial project

UEFA sharply criticized FIFA boss Gianni Infantino on Saturday, saying the Italian-Swiss had lost its confidence, despite the withdrawal of his controversial plan to open international competitions to private investors.

Less than a year before the end of his term and the March 2027 election for which he is currently the only candidate, UEFA has accused Mr. Infantino of having reneged on his commitments with this "shady, opaque project fomented behind the scenes", stating that he had "lost the confidence" of the body like "many other members of the football family".

Criticized from all sides, the former UEFA secretary general announced in a statement overnight the withdrawal of his project to create a company -- the Fifa Forward Enterprise (FFE) -- open to private investors and responsible for managing the commercial and event activities of the body, including the World Cup.

"After carefully listening to all points of view, it became clear that the project has created divisions (...) which are no longer in the interest of the initial objective," acknowledged Infantino, weakened by the opposition of many federations and after the resignation of his chief advisor, Carlos Cordeiro.

This proposal, revealed on Tuesday to general surprise, was massively rejected at the global level, especially by UEFA, which on Thursday "unanimously" threatened not to participate in the next FIFA competitions, including the World Cup, if the project was carried out.

'Anything but transparent'

In its statement released Saturday, the powerful body representing 55 European federations described the abandonment of this project as "a victory for all of football," but specified that it should not "mark the end of the story." "The proposal has been rejected. The task of restoring trust in FIFA has only just begun," it insisted.

UEFA, led by Slovenian Aleksander Ceferin, viewed this project as an attempt by Infantino to "sell a part of the World Cup" to private investors, raising fears of the commercialization of football amid suspicions of conflict of interest.

"If we sell the jewels of football to private investors, we also sell a part of the sport - and above all its soul," commented former FIFA president Sepp Blatter.

In its statement, UEFA directly attacks Infantino, stating that before his election in 2016, he had advocated transparency and assured that FIFA's money came from member associations.

"He failed to keep these two promises," accuses UEFA. "The shady, opaque, and backroom-scheming project he tried to impose by force was anything but transparent."

The abandonment of this project should, according to UEFA, lead to the creation of a "new method of resource allocation through the existing Fifa Forward program" using part of the organization's reserve funds, estimated at $5 billion.

"We need to start using some of that money sitting idle in FIFA's bank account to give football the boost it needs in each of FIFA's 211 member countries. But we don't need to sell off our family jewels to finance that," she wrote.

'Blackmail'

"The future of world football must always be organized around appropriate consultations, collective dialogue and respect for the governance structures of our sport," reacted the president of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), Shaikh Salman, earlier.

Concacaf, composed of 41 federations from North, Central America and the Caribbean, had for its part "rejected the proposal".

The African and Oceanian confederations were less critical, calling on their member associations to "examine" and "evaluate" the project, while the South American Conmebol asked for clarification, calling to "always place football above any other interest".

Among the potential investors, critics of the plan had identified the investment fund Thrive Eternal, created by Joshua Kushner, the brother of Donald Trump's son-in-law, while Gianni Infantino has regularly displayed his close ties with the American president, particularly during the World Cup.

If the project had come to fruition, each of the FIFA member federations could have received an exceptional allocation of $20 million at the beginning of 2027 and seen its allocation increase from $8 million to $20 million over the period 2027-2030.

"A form of blackmail," said Norwegian Football Federation president Lise Klaveness on Friday, asserting that FIFA "did not need this money."

FIFA had given its members until September 19 to decide, according to a letter from Infantino revealed by several media outlets.