The bubo has burst and, if before it was possible to pretend nothing happened, now it becomes decidedly complicated. The scandal that engulfed the top management of world football, leading to the arrest of seven senior managers of Fifa, accused of corruption by the US authorities, could only split the world of football, triggering the most diverse reactions from the national federations.
In the eye of the storm ended up the very president Sepp Blatter, in office for four mandates and looking, in the elections that should (in this case the conditional is a must) be held tomorrow, of his fifth reconfirmation at the helm of Fifa. If UEFA, through a press release, has asked for the postponement of the elections, some national federations have already clarified their point of view: Blatter must go.
Acting as a spokesman for this current of thought was the president of the Football AssociationGreg Dyke: “Blatter said it's time to start rebuilding trust in Fifa but how do you do it while Blatter is still there. Blatter has to go. He has to resign. Or the exit of him must be voted. Or a third way. The damage done to Fifa is so great that it cannot be rebuilt with Blatter still in place."
But if for some, as Dyke said, there can no longer be a FIFA led by the Swiss, for others, such as the Asian Confederation, Blatter remains the best choice: the AFC, in fact, while expressing its "disappointment and sadness" for what happened, continues to "support FIFA president Joseph S. Blatter".
And theItaly? From our Federation for the moment everything is silent. No comment on the FBI investigation by the FIGC, con Tavecchio (several times ended up in the spotlight) who takes time and lets it be known that only today will he make a decision on tomorrow's elections.
Meanwhile, yesterday, the terms of the operation were even clarified by the US Attorney General Loretta Lynch, who spoke at the conference of a "rampant, systemic and deep-rooted corruption in the United States and abroad". The formalized accusations against the Fifa top management, in addition to corruption, are that of money laundering and racketeering.
Lynch called an ingrained system that extended to "at least two generations of officials who allegedly abused their position to acquire millions of dollars in kickbacks and kickbacks." In the viewfinder, clearly, the assignment of major tournaments, and especially the World Championships.
An action, that of US justice, which risks leading to a diplomatic case and yet another battlefield with Russia, which has defined the operation as an illegal extraterritorial application of US law, while Putin speaks of "an attempt not to get Blatter re-elected”, recriminating on the pressures suffered by the FIFA president on assigning the World Cup to Russia.
Fifa, also in check by his team main sponsors, who have asked for a cleanup threatening the termination of the contracts, expressed through the mouth of the director of Communications Walter Di Gregorio, who clarified how "the general secretary Valcke and the president Blatter are not involved" in the procedure that led to the arrest in this proceeding".
Blatter, on the other hand, counterattacked with an open letter on the federation website, in which he defined Fifa as the injured party in the matter, stating that the action of Swiss Attorney General has taken root from a complaint by Fifa itself: "I want to be clear - reads Blatter's open letter -: these misconducts have no citizenship in football and we assure that those who have been involved will be put out of the game".
“Following today's events, the independent Ethics Committee has taken immediate action to provisionally suspend those affected from any activity related to national and international football. These actions are the same that have already been taken by FIFA in the past to exclude any member of the federation who have violated our Code of Ethics."
A Blatter who, more than the scandal itself, seems worried about its possible repercussions on the vote, and who also suffered an attack from his candidate for the presidency, the Jordanian prince Ali Bin Al Hussein: “Fifa needs a leadership that governs, guides and protects our national associations a leadership that takes responsibility for its actions and does not pass the blame. Leadership that restores the trust of hundreds of millions of football fans around the world."
For the world of football, a scandal that is difficult to deal with, but which could also represent an opportunity for rebirth. What remains to be seen is whether football will truly want to change.
