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Swiss Authorities to Investigate FIFA Over 2018 and 2022 World Cup Bids

PeteEU said:
Brazil just had it, so that wont happen.. But some corrections here before the English and Scots start to attack!

It is England.. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland (and British Virgin Islands, Gibraltar and 5+ more "nations")... the UK does not exist in FIFA.

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you are correct, I haven't had my coffee yet. I disagree on Spain and Portugal though, their economies are too tanked at the moment.
 
donsutherland1 said:
Mental slip-up on my part. I was thinking the Olympics when referring to cities. Obviously, the winning bids being investigated by Switzerland concern Russia and Qatar. Your point about the infrastructure is a good one. Perhaps if a runner-up doesn't have the infrastructure in place or can't get it in place in time for 2018, assuming that bid was rigged, the World Cup should be moved to one of the most recent prior host countries. The 2022 World Cup is still seven years away, so it probably can be managed on a somewhat tighter than usual schedule.
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Infrastructure is the key to holding such an event. That is why England, Spain, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany and the US can hold such an event without much effort if need be.
 
Frankly, FIFA looks more and more like an international criminal organization. Maybe it should simply be disbanded and some time should be given to the various national and regional footbal associations to build something new. In the meantime the World Cup can be suspended for a while.
 
PeteEU said:
I am a bit torn about this.... and angry.

On the one hand, it is great that there is finally a real investigation into FIFA and corruption. It is time the top of world football is cleaned up. It wont get rid of Blatter though.

But that it is being lead by a US prosecutor does not exactly scream either legitimacy nor confidence as corruption is rampant in US business and political life and nothing happens there. Not to mention it took this long for them to do anything is kinda... FIFA kicked out the US member who admitted corruption like a decade ago, and the FBI only now does something.. come on.

On top of that, the fact that it took the actions of the FBI to kick the Swiss into action with their own investigation also pisses me off. People have been complaining for years but the Swiss have not done a thing. But then again no one in FIFA of the "rebels" have done a thing either when it comes to pushing for reforms or investigations outside FIFA.

I am afraid that the Swiss and US investigations especially into the Russia bid, will become geo-political big time and have absolutely nothing to do with corruption.. but everything to do with sticking it to Putin. The same goes somewhat for the Qatar bid. We all know how Russia got the WC, and it was open and transparent.

I hope that this will lead to reforms.. removing the UKs privileged status in FIFA, making elections more transparent and fair and basically making the whole organisation a true global one. Would also love to get rid of all these non-nations that are FIFA members and have "national teams".. totally screws with the over all power in the organisation.. all it is, is an attempt to give more power to specific nations. I mean what on earth does American Samoa, Gibraltar, Faroe Islands, British Virgin Islands, Cook Islands, and others have to do with sovereign nations? These places are full voting members of FIFA on the same level as Germany and Spain, but everyone knows that they are proxies for the US, UK and Denmark (Faero Islands), basically giving those countries far more power than they should have.

Now will reforms happen? Some how I doubt it as the "rebels" are being lead in large part by the English FA, who are not exactly the biggest reformers in world football and have been implicated in past corruption.. plus considering they sit on 2 to 3 board places in FIFA already, their motivation to actually reform FIFA might be more words than actual bark.
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US started the investigation because Chuck Blazer was an FBI informant who provided documents detailing that bribery took place on US soil and via US Banks. Swiss opened their own investigation in March 2015 based on information shown to them by FBI.
 
PeteEU said:
You had me interested until you mixed the EU into this discussion..

Again the EU....
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Well, the last time I was concerned with corruption, it was in context of the debt that Greece has to the EZB. Of course, you are right to point out that that is not EU but Euroland.
 
PeteEU said:
There is a reason that FIFA have their HQ and registration in Switzerland... they are not exactly know for their openness and accountability there.
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Umm FIFA was founded in Paris, it was in 1932 they moved to Switzerland because of it's neutrality status, center of Europe and easily accessible. So let's not jump the gun there.
 
LeoVlaming said:
Frankly, FIFA looks more and more like an international criminal organization. Maybe it should simply be disbanded and some time should be given to the various national and regional footbal associations to build something new. In the meantime the World Cup can be suspended for a while.
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It was massively corrupt and everyone knew it. We discussed this in Berlin, when the World Cup was there. There was no way a host could get the games without bribes. But nobody wanted to touch it. So in a way, it was not really criminal as governments and judiciaries knowingly ignored the fact. Or were they accomplices?
 
Kobie said:
Too late to move the 2018 Cup. Not too late to yank the 2022 Cup from Qatar, which was a far more corrupt process.
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It's not too late to move the 2018 World Cup. They moved the World Cup from Colombia (1986) in Nov 1982 to Mexico.
 
I'm not sure which is more corrupt, FIFA, the NCAA, or the IOC.

Beyond the bribes, kickbacks, and academic cheating, the mistreatment of migrant workers (Sochi and Qatar) is both shameful and deadly. It is estimated that 1,400 migrants workers have died since 2010 building World Cup facilities in Qatar. In 2014, Nepalese migrant workers in Qatar were dying at a rate of one every two days. Russia took a PR hit over the mistreatment of migrant workers constructing the Sochi Olympics, so Moscow has decided to use prison labor for the 2018 World Cup construction ... which ensures state information-control over prisoner injuries and deaths.
 
nota bene said:
That's a good question, and one of my first thoughts was that soccer isn't all that big here.
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This isn't exactly true. MLS has ****ty viewership. But European leagues do very well in the US. EPL viewership beats out NHL in viewers. During the World Cup US viewership (includes EPSN and Univision) for the final in 2014 was 26m (according to nielsen ratings which is a joke cause they only count tvs and sports are a group thing). US vs Portugal was 17m just for ESPN.
 
austrianecon said:
Umm FIFA was founded in Paris, it was in 1932 they moved to Switzerland because of it's neutrality status, center of Europe and easily accessible. So let's not jump the gun there.
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"Neutrality status".. read banking laws.
 
austrianecon said:
US started the investigation because Chuck Blazer was an FBI informant who provided documents detailing that bribery took place on US soil and via US Banks. Swiss opened their own investigation in March 2015 based on information shown to them by FBI.
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Yes but everyone knew that Chuck Blazer was corrupt and it was not until he turned to informant that the FBI started its case.
 
SlevinKelevra said:
you are correct, I haven't had my coffee yet. I disagree on Spain and Portugal though, their economies are too tanked at the moment.
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Spain's economy is growing more than the US and UK.. just saying. Plus the "economy" has nothing really to do with it. It has to do with hotels, public and private transportation systems and of course stadiums. Considering that Spain is the second biggest tourist country on the planet, the hotels and public/private transporation is covered and since La Liga is the best league in the world (inc angry Englishmen), then.. 2 of the biggest and most modern stadiums are in Spain. Spain could easily hold the World Cup.
 
austrianecon said:
This isn't exactly true. MLS has ****ty viewership. But European leagues do very well in the US. EPL viewership beats out NHL in viewers. During the World Cup US viewership (includes EPSN and Univision) for the final in 2014 was 26m (according to nielsen ratings which is a joke cause they only count tvs and sports are a group thing). US vs Portugal was 17m just for ESPN.
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Add in Univision and the numbers were much higher. MLS gets good enough ratings to be on ABC, ESPN, Fox Soccer and Univision, they are getting great attendance for games, more than many NBA or NHL teams
 
Kobie said:
Russia's not using slave labor and having hundreds of workers die every few weeks to construct the facilities.
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Indeed. I think the same eye should be cast on the Olympics. The Sochi Olympics made absolutely no sense.
 
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jmotivator said:
Indeed. I think the same eye should be cast on the Olympics. The Sochi Olympics made absolutely no sense.
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Well neither did the Salt Lake City games....or as it is better known as..the corruption games.
 
PeteEU said:
"Neutrality status".. read banking laws.
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No, read the fact that Europe was in entrenched in major issues in the early 20th century. Between WW1 and WW2. If FIFA was in another country during the Cold War, Soviet Union would have been banned.
 
PeteEU said:
Well neither did the Salt Lake City games....or as it is better known as..the corruption games.
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Hey, at least that caused them to liberalize the alcohol laws in Utah. They still have to get rid of the "Mormon Curtain" at bars though...
 
LeoVlaming said:
FIFA is a totally discredited organisation. Organizing a world cup football in Qatar amounts to screaming out loud that you only care about money and bribes and have zero interest in football as a sport.
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As soon as Qatar came out of the hat I knew this was the case. How can a country with little interest in football little sporting infrastructure and temperatures reaching 50C in the summer be thought a suitable venue for holding the World cup ? What Qatar did have though was plenty of cash for bribes
 
LeoVlaming said:
I tend to agree. Given the pretty rampant corruption in Russia there was probably also corruption involved there. But at least Russia is less of an obviously wrongheaded choice to organize a world cup.
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Irrespective of its corruption in my view Russia is long overdue for its crack at holding the World Cup. At least they do actually play the game and in temperate conditions
 
PeteEU said:
Yes but everyone knew that Chuck Blazer was corrupt and it was not until he turned to informant that the FBI started its case.
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Except for the complaints starting 1998 over Sepp starting at his first election over Lennart Johansson. Then in 2002 when Michel Zen-Ruffinen wrote a 30 page report to the executive committee detailing corruption. These all pre-date Chuck Blazer. Hell, Sepp Blatter won't even set foot in the US anymore because of Chuck Blazer.
 
PeteEU said:
Well neither did the Salt Lake City games....or as it is better known as..the corruption games.
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SLC did make sense.. it's a winter city. Sochi is one of the furthest south winter games held.
 
nota bene said:
That's a good question, and one of my first thoughts was that soccer isn't all that big here.
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It is big, but just not huge and no doubt Americans love big world events. I was surprised to find out that the best attended World Cup is still the 1994 one with 12 less matches than 2014 which is the 2nd best attended. The US is also a very popular place for big stars on the back end of their career to get recognized.
 
PeteEU said:
Well neither did the Salt Lake City games....or as it is better known as..the corruption games.
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When you have to truck in snow because your weather is too warm you are not a viable candidate for a winter games.
 
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