Three weeks before the election for the presidency of FIFA, a question arises in the corridors of the organization, on the heights of Zurich: who is leading the maneuver today? Which leader is calling the shots and pulling the strings? Officially, Issa Hayatou. The African football boss was inducted as interim president on the basis of age after the suspension of Sepp Blatter. But in fact, another character seems to have donned the referee's outfit in the race for the presidency of FIFA. His name: Vitaly Mutko.
To those who still doubted the influence of the Russian Minister of Sports, information revealed by the agency Tass raises the last reservations. Vitaly Mutko announced it on Wednesday February 3 to a handful of journalists: a meeting presented as secret will be held on February 17 between the five candidates to succeed Sepp Blatter. His location has not been revealed. Not yet. But the Russian leader would be at the origin.
The information is not trivial. It comes a few days after the Russian Federation loudly announced its support for Gianni Infantino, the general secretary of UEFA, the European bloc's presumed candidate for the FIFA presidency. Vitaly Mutko made it public after meeting Infantino in Moscow, where the Italian-Swiss came to attend the official presentation of the Confederations Cup mascot in 2017.
But, a detail revealing his influence, the idea of a meeting between the five applicants would have been put forward during a telephone interview between Vitaly Mutko and Sheikh Salman, the candidate from Bahrain, often presented for several weeks as the favorite. “I received a call today from Sheikh Salman and we discussed this issue,” the Russian leader explained. We talked about a meeting on February 17, where everyone will be seated around the table. We will be able to openly discuss the support to be given to each other. But there is no doubt in my mind that it would be better if there was one candidate for Europe and Asia. His chances would be better. »
Will the meeting take place? Will all five applicants take part? To be continued. But it seems unlikely that such a meeting, eight days before the election, will clarify the landscape and reduce the race to two or three rivals. According to the Insideworldfootball site, Jérôme Champagne has not yet been informed of the February 17 meeting. The Frenchman was, however, the only one of the five candidates to accept the idea of an electoral debate, proposed successively by the television channels ESPN and BBC, as well as by the European Parliament.
Vitaly Mutko would therefore be the shadow man in a race for the presidency of FIFA that is more obscure than ever. The Russian leader readily shows himself to be a cumulator. Minister of Sports, he also chairs the Russian Football Federation and sits on the FIFA executive committee. A strong man in Russia's bid for the 2018 World Cup, he will undoubtedly play the leading role. The man of the shadows. For the moment.
