The Trumpet Newspaper Issue 549 (July 14 - 27 2021)

Sport
JULY 14 - 27 2021
TheTrumpet
A healthier and more competitive
football for all
Page13
Recently, FIFA President Gianni
Infantino was a special guest of
the second edition of the EFE
Sport Business Forum, broadcast from
Madrid.
In an interview spanning almost an
hour, the President discussed a myriad
of topics. The following is an abridged
version of the full interview.
Watching football games these last
few days, football is back at the top of
the entertainment industry, isn’t it?
Yes, definitely. I believe football is
bringing us a lot of excitement these
days, with the [UEFA] EURO and the
[CONMEBOL] Copa América. The
[CONCACAF] Gold Cup will also take
place soon. Because of the pandemic
there was a moment in which, football
stopped all around the world. This
hadn’t happened since the war and it
was very tough for everyone.
There are many people who have
suffered and who are still suffering, but
the fact that football is back, although
the stadiums are not full yet, gives us the
feeling that we are going back to
normality.
What kind of new things are to be
introduced related to the global
transfer market. What will be the role
of the clearing house that FIFA wants
to create?
If we think of last year before
COVID-19, $7billion was spent in the
international transfer market. Of that
figure, $700 million went directly to
agents and only $70 million went to the
clubs that trained and developed the
players.
Our principle is to reform the
transfer market because we don’t think
that it’s positive to have such a huge
flow of money with almost no rules. A
clearing house will ensure that clubs
training players will be able to receive
the money they are owed, because there
is a solidarity mechanism which
establishes that 5% of the transfer must
be paid to the clubs that provided the
training. This is already in our rules. But
the truth is that only $60 or $70 million
is paid out.
Why? Because these clubs are small
clubs who don’t have the means, who
don’t know they can receive this money.
Who don’t have enough time to ask for
it or can’t pay lawyers to go to court. So,
we want to automate all this to ensure
the process is completely transparent.
FIFPro have requested a fairer
and more reasonable football
calendar. Are so many competitions
really needed? What is the situation
right now regarding the 24-team
FIFA Club World Cup project?
I am convinced this is the opinion of
the vast majority of football
associations, leagues, clubs, fans,
players around the world: we want
football to be healthier, less
discriminatory and more competitive.
To achieve this, we have to look at the
entire international schedule. We have
asked Arsène Wenger, whose football
expertise and professionalism no one
would deny, to take charge of this
process.
In this consultation process we have
undertaken, we started with the key
stakeholders. With players, and
managers, to get to know their opinions
and how they want football to be run in
the coming years.
What do they think about the Club
World Cup? The World Cup, the EURO,
the [CONMEBOL] Copa América,
about the [CAF] Africa Cup [of
Nations], the [AFC] Asian Cup? What
are their thoughts on clubs? What do
they think of traveling in September,
October, November, March from one
continent to another? What are their
opinions about playing two matches and
going back or playing four games with
their clubs and then playing again with
their national teams? All of these issues
are very important, and we also want to
hear the fans’ thoughts on them.
Our goal, is to globalise football. We
might ask ourselves whether football is
global or not. Of course, football is the
number one sport in the world, and
football is perhaps global in regards to
passion, emotion and the heart, but it is
absolutely not global in regards to
opportunities to play, the opportunities
to compete, the chances that players
FIFA President Gianni Infantino
have to play at their best in an important
tournament.
My ambition, my dream, our idea,
our philosophy, is to have maybe around
50 clubs from every continent being
able to win a Club World Cup, and to
have around 50 countries, 50 national
teams from every continent being able
to win a World Cup. If we manage to do
this, I think football will be in great
shape.
Let’s talk about women’s football.
What steps are you taking in the short
or medium term to expand, in this
field?
Women’s football is the sport out of
all sports that’s going to see the biggest
growth in the next ten years. I don’t
know where I will be in ten years, but
we’ll talk again, we’ll check the figures,
and we’ll compare women’s football
growth with any other women’s or
men’s sport, and we’ll see the numbers.
I’m not just talking about revenues,
but general figures. The last [FIFA]
Women’s World Cup, that took place in
France and was such a huge success,
was seen by 1.2 billion people around
the world. 1.2 billion. More than one
million people in the stands. For the
final alone, we had 263 million viewers.
It’s a sport we have to develop across
the world. That’s why, we at FIFA have
decided to invest $1bn to develop
women’s football, for example, in
projects all around the world, so that
girls can more easily access football in
every country in the world.
I remember the last [FIFA] U-17
Women’s World Cup in Uruguay.
Mexico and Spain contested the final,
and they aren’t countries you’d
historically associate with the
development of women’s football. So,
we have to keep on developing more.
And also, for women’s football, we hold
the same consultation as we do for
men’s football in terms of the
international calendar.
Let’s talk about the World Cup
2030. There are several candidates.
How do you view our Spain-Portugal
bid?
After the FIFA reforms, the FIFA
President doesn’t even have a vote when
it comes to this because it’s the 211
countries who will vote. As President of
FIFA, it’s important to note that once
more there is a renewed interest from a
lot of countries around the world in
becoming candidates. What does that
mean? That means people have faith in
the FIFA process. That may not always
have been the case but it is now because
we have already held votes, for example
for the [FIFA] World Cup 2026 two
years ago, in an open, transparent, and
public process.
There are experts observing the
process, it all gets audited, and the votes
are public and transparent. So, what we
can guarantee Spain and Portugal, what
we can guarantee every country that
wants to host the next World Cup, after
2026 in North America, is that the
process will have total integrity and total
transparency. The more candidates there
are, the better it is for the President of
FIFA, or for FIFA. May the best one
win!
We’re in 2021 now. Could you
briefly explain what the next two
years of FIFA will look like?
Our vision is to make football truly
global. If we grow, we can all grow. In
order for football to grow around the
world, we cannot discriminate against
anyone.
Football cannot be reserved for the
few; it has to be open for everyone. And
even the big stakeholders will benefit
from football being open for everyone.
I believe that the gap between the big
and the small is becoming increasingly
wide. Our job must be to globalise
football, starting with young people in
the youth World Cups in development,
to give every talent in the world a
chance, and every boy and girl the
chance to dream.
This is the 2023 vision: to make
football truly global. We have to be
devoted, very open to ideas. We have to
be brave also, because some people
might be scared of change. But, I think
that we have to go with conviction,
positivity; it is necessary to include the
world and make football even more –
much more – global than it is.