Sepp Blatter Deservedly Gets His Own

Some Kind Of Justice

This blog's had a very dim view of Sepp Blatter and FIFA for a long time. It goes all the way back to the 2006 World Cup. 28th June 2006 to be exact wherein a crappy ref decision allowed the Italians to slot a goal and go through to the next round of the finals. It was a tough loss on the back of a terrible referee decision, that even Sepp Blatter thought was a bad call. Somewhere along the line I found the disconnect between the obvious problems of refereeing international games, the way the World Cups are selected and staged and how the money flows amounted to one big conflict of interest with Sepp Blatter at its heart. Amazingly, this wasn't (and isn't) some kind of blinding insight, it turned out to have been fairly commonly accepted information about the modus operandi of FIFA.

The thing is, Sepp Blatter looked too comfortable with all these problems. And usually, the best way for me to understand just how bent these practices are, is to imagine the commissioner of the MLB doing the sorts of things Sepp Blatter has been accused of doing and how unseemly that would look. Would Rob Manfred or Bud Selig before him do...? What would that look like and how would the scribes respond? I'm not saying baseball has better administrative practices (although probably does), but unlike the premier Euro and Latin American sport, it is followed by a fairly critical press that parses everything. FIFA an Blatter in most part looked way out of step, even a decade ago.

I think that's about where this blog parted ways with football. There are other entries since, but really, that 2006 World Cup and its aftermath killed me. Even more than the Red Sox comeback in 2004 which also killed me - but not enough to hate baseball. That being said, bad referee calls are part of sport. The road to hell is paved not with good intentions but umpiring decisions. What really browned me off was Sepp Blatter's cavalier take on it, which amounted to how he doesn't care what the punters think in the outer outposts of football fandom. Especially places like Australia. Which is insulting because a lot of people have put tremendous amounts of effort in to make football have a place in country with 2 variant rugby codes and AFL.

The logical retort to that has been to say I will care no longer for the product you are pushing. I have many other more pleasing options for spectator sport without the aggravation of FIFA and its sport. And that's how it went down with me. Next to the Olympic Games, the most ethically vexed sports aren't the one-time steroids-addled baseball or cycling but the ethically bankrupt football.

As for Sepp and his FIFA cronies, they ended up on the FBI's radar after the dodgy World Cup choice of doing one in Russia. Worse still, there was the failed campaign by the FFA to invite the World Cup to Australia that lost to Dubai, which also cost $40million of our tax payers money in what can only be described as bribes. Yes, worse than the IOC and its 100 or so voting members, the FIFA votes comes down to 23 people, and you can't tell me they're not corruptible or collusive. Where exactly does 40-odd million dollars go in lobbying 20-odd people but inevitably into their pockets?

Clearly the US Federal Government thought FIFA was dodgy and has since pursued them mightily, which has resulted in this bit of good news: Sepp Blatter and his head flunky have been banned for 
8years from the game.

ZURICH: Sepp Blatter says he will appeal against his eight-year ban from football to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. 

Blatter also insists that he still views himself as FIFA president despite being banned for eight years by FIFA's ethics committee on Monday. 

Speaking at a news conference, Blatter said: "I fight for me and I will fight for FIFA. Suspended for eight years for what? 

"I'm sorry as president of FIFA I'm this punching ball." 

Blatter and Michel Platini were each banned for eight years by the FIFA ethics committee in a stunning blow for world soccer's most powerful leaders. 

FIFA president Blatter and his one-time protege Platini were kicked out of the sport for conflict of interest and disloyalty to FIFA in a $US2 million ($2.79 million) payment deal that is also the subject of a criminal investigation in Switzerland.
Blatter's FIFA career is ending in disgrace after more than 17 years as president and 40 years in total with the scandal-hit governing body.

Great. He's going to be a rogue President of FIFA. That's like Rob Manfred taking bribes to rig the amateur draft, then getting banned from the sport like Pete Rose but still insisting he's the commissioner. It's that weird. Clearly he didn't resign like he said he would when the FBI started investigating FIFA. Anyway, it's nice to see them get some cold hard justice served up to them.