European football officials are maintaining their demands for Gianni Infantino to resign as president of the world governing body, despite an apology delivered during a meeting of the FIFA Council in Zurich. The three-and-a-half-hour gathering marked the first time the FIFA president faced his critics directly since proposing a controversial World Cup investor plan earlier in the year.
DFB Bernd Neuendorf stated that the gathering yielded few concrete outcomes regarding the deep-seated tensions within the organization. “We asked a lot of critical questions, and from my point of view, there were no satisfactory answers,” Neuendorf said after the Zurich meeting. Infantino listened to the concerns raised by executive members and promised to address all topics, but failed to provide a specific timeline for delivering those answers.
Debbie Hewitt, the English FIFA vice-president, noted that Infantino began the session by apologizing to his colleagues for surprising them with the investor proposal and causing widespread uproar. “He said that with a certain remorse,” Hewitt remarked, while emphasizing that the executive leadership demands accountability. “The man has to answer these questions. If he doesn’t answer these questions, then he is not fit to be FIFA president,” Hewitt said.
European Officials Maintain Search for a Presidential Challenger
With trust eroded among key member associations, European officials face a strict deadline to organize an opposition for the upcoming leadership ballot. By November 18, European associations must put forward a potential challenger to run against Infantino in the FIFA presidential election scheduled for March 2027.
“As I said, trust in him is lost,” Neuendorf said. “Now new people have to develop new ideas, and it has to be clarified how we are going to put this organization, which is extremely important for world football, on a serious footing.”
New Governance Structure and Working Group Formed
To prevent future unilateral actions on major projects, the Council authorized the formation of a dedicated working group led by FIFA Vice-Sheikh Salman Bin Ebrahim al Khalifa. This body is tasked with reorganizing the governing structure of the global organization, ensuring that sweeping initiatives similar to the contested World Cup investor plan cannot be advanced without broader consensus.
Additionally, the Council addressed several other high-profile administrative items during the Zurich session. A decision regarding the future of the contentious FIFA Peace Prize—which Infantino awarded to Donald Trump the previous year—was scheduled for the next Council meeting on December 16 in Doha. Furthermore, the council advanced a proposal to increase annual financial grants to all 211 national member associations from roughly 10 to approximately 25 million dollars, an initiative brought forward by Infantino shortly before the meeting.
Meanwhile, a separate proposal concerning red card disciplinary rules was dismissed. Following the scrutiny surrounding the lifting of a suspension for U.S. player Folarin Balogun—which followed interventions by Trump and Infantino—officials had considered eliminating appeal options against mandatory one-match minimum bans, a change that Hewitt confirmed was ultimately rejected.
Related reading
