By Ian Ransom<\/p>\n
MELBOURNE, Aug 3 (Reuters) \u2013 Gianni Infantino\u2019s hopes of extending his FIFA presidency may rest less on winning back soccer\u2019s traditional powers than on calling in favours from the many small and emerging nations that rely heavily on the world governing body\u2019s largesse.<\/p>\n
Infantino is facing the biggest crisis of his decade-long tenure\u00a0after regional \u200bconfederations UEFA and CONCACAF declared no confidence in his leadership following the abortive proposal to bring private equity \u200cinto the World Cup.<\/p>\n
He confirmed his intention to stand for a fourth term at next year\u2019s Congress in April but the pressure on Infantino may not wait until the election.<\/p>\n
Wales on Monday became the first soccer federation to formally withdraw support for Infantino, while European body UEFA confirmed it had written to the 56-year-old Swiss to inform him it was weighing legal action against him regarding the proposal.<\/p>\n
Opponents can mount a push to depose him \u200cwith \u200ba vote at an Extraordinary Congress (EC) if 20% of FIFA\u2019s membership of 211 member \u2060associations request one in writing.<\/p>\n
An EC would \u2060need to be held within three months of a request, providing time for rival candidates to emerge.<\/p>\n
UEFA, whose 55 member nations voted to boycott all FIFA tournaments if the stake sale went ahead, alone could trigger an EC with a unanimous vote.<\/p>\n
But getting a majority of FIFA\u2019s membership to vote Infantino out at the EC may not be an \u200beasy task.<\/p>\n
Despite vast disparities in wealth, soccer development and influence across the footballing world, all 211 nations have an equal vote.<\/p>\n
Rather than smoothing things over with established football giants like France, Spain and England, Infantino\u2019s best chance of clinging to power may \u2060rest with members like Bhutan and Vanuatu \u2014 emerging nations that have never \u2060competed at a World Cup and rely overwhelmingly on FIFA to support their football programmes and \u200bparticipate in international events.<\/p>\n
FIFA members have been able to claim up to $3 million for soccer development projects over the course of \u200bthe 2023-26 World Cup cycle, $1 million more than the previous cycle.<\/p>\n
The money is small beer for rich \u200cnations with professional teams but vital for football\u2019s have-nots.<\/p>\n
The stake sale was always aimed at the latter members, and many have done well under Infantino\u2019s patronage.<\/p>\n
VANUATU\u00a0INFLUENCE<\/p>\n
Vanuatu are ranked 160th in the world and sixth among the Oceania confederation teams but their football association head Lambert Maltock has a seat at FIFA\u2019s highest table as one of eight vice-presidents in the body\u2019s Executive Council.<\/p>\n
FIFA gave the island \u2060nation of about 340,000 people a development grant of $4.15 million to help build a 6,500-seat stadium in the capital Port Vila, which was completed in 2022.<\/p>\n
For Vanuatu\u2019s first professional player, Brian Kaltak, Infantino\u2019s backing has been a huge boost for the country and \u2060developing nations generally.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst of all, he gave \u200ca chance for our president to be part of FIFA and then with development projects, \u2060he\u2019s been trying to grow the game \u2014 not just Vanuatu but all third-world countries,\u201d the \u200bPerth Glory \u200cdefender told Reuters on Monday.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s opening up more chances for a team like ours, for \u200bnations like ours \u2060to make it \u2026 It\u2019s been a massive help.\u201d<\/p>\n
Similar funding splashes are common across Asia, Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific, where FIFA grants have financed training pitches, gyms and soccer programmes that national associations would otherwise struggle to finance.<\/p>\n
For critics, however, that same funding model has reinforced a system in which FIFA trades financial power for political influence, making it difficult to build a coalition to unseat an incumbent president.<\/p>\n
Any campaign to remove Infantino may ultimately be a numbers game that extends far beyond Europe\u2019s traditional elite.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by \u200bIan Ransom; Editing by Ed Osmond)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Ian Ransom MELBOURNE, Aug 3 (Reuters) \u2013 Gianni Infantino\u2019s hopes of extending his FIFA presidency may rest…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":844233,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,561,82],"class_list":["post-844232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/844232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=844232"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/844232\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/844233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=844232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=844232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=844232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}