UEFA welcomes FIFA U-turn but says Infantino ‘has failed to deliver’

UEFA welcomes FIFA U-turn but says Infantino ‘has failed to deliver’ UEFA has welcomed FIFA’s decision to abandon its plan to sell a stake in the World Cup , but turned the same statement into a blistering attack on Gianni Infantino, accusing the FIFA president of betraying the promises that first won him office. In an official statement , UEFA say the scheme to open FIFA’s competitions to private investors was “unanimously rejected by UEFA’s national associations”, Italy’s FIGC among the 55, and by federations of every size worldwide. The proposal had provoked an extraordinary revolt in recent days: European nations threatened to boycott the World Cup, confederations in North America and Asia rejected it, and a senior adviser to Infantino, Carlos Cordeiro, resigned in protest, before the president finally backed down on Friday evening. Italian football had been prominent among the critics, with Juventus chief executive Giovanni Carnevali stating this week that “55 federations” opposed FIFA’s direction and adding pointedly: “I like things done cleanly.” UEFA thanked those who had, it said, shown the FIFA president that “football is not for sale”, then sharpened its tone considerably. “We cannot keep going on like this with secret schemes on fast track timescales, cooked up by faceless individuals and of dubious benefit to the game,” the statement read, demanding that those responsible be identified and held to account. MEXICO CITY, MEXICO – JUNE 10: Gianni Infantino, President of FIFA, speaks to the media during a FIFA World Cup 2026 Opening Press Conference at Mexico City Stadium on June 10, 2026 in Mexico City, Mexico. (Photo by Carl Recine/Getty Images) UEFA says FIFA leadership has lost the game’s confidence The proposal would have raised around $4.2bn from investors, led by a group fronted by Joshua Kushner – for roughly a 20% stake in a new commercial entity valued at $20bn. For UEFA, the manner of it was as damning as the substance: “The current FIFA leadership has not only lost UEFA’s confidence but also that of many other members of the football family.” The body then reached back to Infantino’s 2016 election pitch, when he pledged transparency and told the associations that “the money of FIFA is your money”, meant to serve the development of football. On both counts, UEFA delivered its verdict bluntly: “On both these promises, he has failed to deliver.” With reserves standing above $5bn, it argued, that money had been left idle rather than invested in the game. UEFA said it would act immediately to propose a new way of distributing resources through FIFA’s existing Forward programme, insisting there was no need to “sell off the family silver” to fund the grassroots across FIFA’s 211 nations. It framed the outcome as “a victory for the whole game”, while warning that “the task of rebuilding trust in FIFA has only just begun.”