Newly re-elected FIFA president, Gianni Infantino has criticised the ‘rich FIFA’ reports about the world soccer’s governing body, and labelled some of the criticism of FIFA as ‘personal attack’.

The Swiss-Italian administrator who was re-elected in in June 2019, was the only candidate in Thursday’s presidential election at the Fifa congress in Rwanda.

“Being Fifa president is an incredible honour, an incredible privilege,” said Infantino after he was reanointed.

“And it is also a great responsibility. I am truly humbled and touched by your support, and I promise you that I will continue serving Fifa, serving football all over the world and serving all 211 Fifa member associations.”

President Infantino also referenced impending changes to the FIFA Under-17 World Cups at boys’ and girls’ level, which will see those tournaments played on an annual basis, as well as the launch of the FIFA World Series and the revised 32-team FIFA Club World Cup™, with the intention of giving teams from every confederation more opportunities to compete on the global stage.

He said that whenever FIFA proposed a competition it was portrayed in the media as “a money-making exercise”.

He drew a comparison with the Premier League and claimed it earned as much in one year as FIFA earned in four.

“The Premier League makes four times of what FIFA makes per year.

“I don’t understand why there is always this ‘rich FIFA’ attack. In addition to that the personal attacks. Again, why?”

Advertisement