Softbank’s $25bn Fifa shake-up hangs on crunch vote
Uefa to oppose expansion of Club World Cup and potential threat to Champions League
A SoftBank-led proposal to create new tournaments with Fifa faces a make-or-break vote on Friday, with the backers of the $25bn plan set to walk away unless international football’s governing body can secure agreement among its divided membership.
The vote marks a crucial moment for Gianni Infantino, Fifa president, who wants to radically transform the sport through an expansion of the Club World Cup, an annual competition between seven of the globe’s top clubs, as well as create a new league contest for national sides.
Delegates from Fifa’s 37-member governing council are gathering in Kigali, Rwanda for showdown talks on the proposals that have polarised powerful factions and major clubs in world football.
Fifa has engaged in secret talks for months with a consortium of international investors including Japan’s SoftBank, which has pledged to inject $25bn into a Fifa-controlled joint venture that would run the tournaments.
Mr Infantino has previously said the investors represented “major interests and multinationals in Asia, Europe and North America”.
A person close to the talks said there was no longer any sovereign involvement in the investor proposal, after heavy speculation that the entities close to the governments of Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi formed part of the group.
There is growing concern among the group about Mr Infantino’s ability to carry the proposal through its ruling council, having already postponed a vote on the plan earlier in May.
Fifa and the consortium will be forced to abandon their talks unless requisite support is secured this week, according to a person close to the negotiations.
Uefa, European football’s governing body, was set to vote against the proposals, with people close to the body saying that all nine Uefa members on the Fifa council were expected to remain steadfast in their opposition.
“We’re not going to vote for it,” said a person close to Uefa’s leadership, adding that leading European clubs and leagues have been consulted and would back its stance. “Given that [Fifa] are wanting 50 per cent of the competition to be made up of European clubs, that’s not a good start for the competition.”
According to documents seen by the Financial Times, Mr Infantino will present a number of options which each involve expanding the Club World Cup from seven teams to 24.
The first envisages the competition taking place every four years, over 18 days “in June, the year before the Fifa World Cup”. The second would be a be a “yearly competition, as a pre-season tournament in July-August”. While a third option is an annual competition “in another time slot to be discussed further.”
Uefa is planning to object to all the options believing they represent a threat to the Champions League, considered the pinnacle of the club game, which draws about €2.5bn in broadcasting and sponsorship revenues every year.
A separate proposal to create a global “nations league” competition — expanding on an initiative that Uefa has already implemented for European national sides — is seen as less contentious.
For months, Fifa members have complained that they have been provided little information over the identity of investors in the SoftBank-led group.
A spokesman for the body said: “Fifa is not aware of any threat and remains, as always, open for discussion. That is the main objective of the council meeting and to speculate on the conclusions of these discussions is obviously premature.”
SoftBank declined to comment.