Infantino apologised to the FIFA Council in Zurich, and the FA’s Debbie Hewitt says he is still not fit to lead unless he answers

The FIFA Council met in Zurich on Thursday for the first time since the FIFA Forward Enterprise plan came out in July, and the meeting ran for three and a half hours. Gianni Infantino used some of that time to say sorry. Debbie Hewitt, the FA chair and a FIFA vice-president, came out of the room unconvinced.

Infantino did not take questions from the media afterwards. He put out a video statement instead. “First of all, I apologised for the mistakes that we made in relation to the communication and consultation process,” he said, adding that the plan had been a proposal and “in no way a done deal.”

Sorry for the process, not the plan

The plan, known as FFE, would have handed part of FIFA’s commercial rights to a private investment firm. Infantino dropped it within days of it becoming public, after a furious response led by UEFA. In his statement he said the idea had been to let FIFA invest more in its member associations, not to replace the support they already get.

Hewitt’s reading of the apology was narrower. As she saw it, he was sorry for not bringing the plan to the Council first, which is not the same as being sorry for the plan. She said there had been “some contrition”, but that she had no new information to change her mind, other than having a president who was apologetic.

Her main complaint is the paperwork. She has asked repeatedly for the FFE documents and still does not have them, and on Thursday the Council members were told to put their questions in writing. Infantino said he would answer them “in due course.”

“The man has to answer those questions,” Hewitt said. If he does not, she said, he is not fit to be FIFA president.

Balogun and the Peace Prize

FFE was not the only thing on the table. Hewitt called the Folarin Balogun case one of the biggest issues discussed. The United States striker’s red-card ban was suspended after Donald Trump asked for the decision to be reviewed, and there is now a proposal to change FIFA’s disciplinary code so an automatic one-match ban for a red card cannot be suspended. FIFA’s legal committee reports back to the Council in December.

So does its Football Social Responsibility Committee, which will look into how the FIFA Peace Prize, awarded to Trump, came about. Reforming the prize or revoking it are both on the list of options.

The election clock

All of it lands with an election coming. Infantino is standing for re-election in March, and anyone who wants to run against him has until 18 November to declare. A challenger needs letters of support from five member associations.

Ramon Vega, the former Switzerland and Tottenham defender, says he will stand, though he may struggle to get the five letters. Senior European figures are reported to want Arsène Wenger, who has been FIFA’s chief of global football development since 2019, and nobody knows yet whether he will do it. Hewitt’s view is simple: Infantino needs an opponent, and all 211 member associations deserve a real choice.

UEFA’s position has not moved either. It is preparing a criminal complaint against Infantino in Switzerland, and in August it asked three US federal courts to order the release of FFE documents. If those papers end up coming out through a courtroom before they come out through the Council, Thursday’s apology is going to look very small.

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