FIFA arrests (now with improved Blatter/Platini bans!)

[Liventia]

Chuck Blazer's testimony unsealed. Biggest bombshell: France bought the 98 World Cup hosting rights.

EDIT:
To clarify, Blazer says he took bribes in deciding that host vote, not specifically mentioning who they were from.

[Maineiacs]

If elected, I promise to make everyone else in the world stop laughing at the words "Major League Soccer".

We'll still laugh at the league though, so that's ok.

We're improving the quality of play. Pretty soon we might even have our more talented players stay domestically rather than run off the Europe.

[Dooom35796821595]

Apparently Blatter got a 10 minute standing ovation today...
One must wonder how much of his bribe money he spent on that.

[Vassenor]

Apparently Blatter got a 10 minute standing ovation today...
One must wonder how much of his bribe money he spent on that.

It was the ordinary office staff, so it's possible it's just his massive fucking personality cult.

[New Skaaneland]

Hehe, "stay strong". I almost feel a bit bad for the other message I had.

[Reploid Productions]

It should instead be each city builds a giant robot that fight in a tournament to determine the host city.

And if your city's robot has its head destroyed, then it's disqualified. Otherwise, it can be repaired and return to competition as many times as the pilot wants.

Y'know, soccer is only one of many things that would be improved by the addition of giant fighting robots.

[Gauthier]

It should instead be each city builds a giant robot that fight in a tournament to determine the host city.

And if your city's robot has its head destroyed, then it's disqualified. Otherwise, it can be repaired and return to competition as many times as the pilot wants.

Y'know, soccer is only one of many things that would be improved by the addition of giant fighting robots.

Or just have robots playing soccer for humans. It doesn't have to be just boxing and football.

[Vassenor]

"Sepp Blatter’s re-election is a victory for democracy"

...Uh, what?

[Gauthier]

"Sepp Blatter’s re-election is a victory for democracy"

...Uh, what?

Hilariously, the backlash starts with the comment section.

[Dooom35796821595]

It should instead be each city builds a giant robot that fight in a tournament to determine the host city.

And if your city's robot has its head destroyed, then it's disqualified. Otherwise, it can be repaired and return to competition as many times as the pilot wants.

Y'know, soccer is only one of many things that would be improved by the addition of giant fighting robots.

It would liven up political debates, all it would need is for the fighters to be introduced by Harry Hill.

[New Athene]

http://www.theguardian.com/football/liv ... probe-live

More corruption from the Blatter Boys.

[Risottia]

http://www.bbc.com/news/32998735

Chuck Blazer confirms ZA paid bribes to host the 2010 World Cup.

[Alyska]

"Sepp Blatter’s re-election is a victory for democracy"

...Uh, what?

Apparently that publication's editorial policy is that America always wrong no matter what. They would side with Satan if he were being investigated by US authorities.

[Vassenor]

"Sepp Blatter’s re-election is a victory for democracy"

...Uh, what?

Apparently that publication's editorial policy is that America always wrong no matter what. They would side with Satan if he were being investigated by US authorities.

Yeah, it did seem to be the sort of standard "EHRMAHGAHD AMERICA BAD" hitpiece that reads like it's written by the Russian Propaganda Ministry.

[Vassenor]

Fifa crisis: Jack Warner 'to reveal all despite fears'

Shit has gotten real.

[Maineiacs]

Fifa crisis: Jack Warner 'to reveal all despite fears'

Shit has gotten real.

Isn't he the one who thought the recent Onion article about FIFA granting the U.S. an extra World Cup competition to placate us was real?

[Vassenor]

Fifa crisis: Jack Warner 'to reveal all despite fears'

Shit has gotten real.

Isn't he the one who thought the recent Onion article about FIFA granting the U.S. an extra World Cup competition to placate us was real?

So what you're saying is that because he was grasping at straws out of desperation everything he says is wrong?

[Tsaraine]

It sounds like Warner, having known for a while that shit was wrong, prepared an insurance policy by collating wrongdoing by his colleagues and sending it to a third party to be released if/when Warner needed to redirect blame off himself and onto everyone else; an insurance policy that he is cashing in on now that the chickens are all coming home to roost.

[The Archregimancy]

It sounds like Warner, having known for a while that shit was wrong, prepared an insurance policy by collating wrongdoing by his colleagues and sending it to a third party to be released if/when Warner needed to redirect blame off himself and onto everyone else; an insurance policy that he is cashing in on now that the chickens are all coming home to roost.

Warner has a track record, though....

What will Jack Warner’s “avalanche” reveal? Clues may lie in his 2011 “tsunami” - the last time he threatened to take Fifa apart. Warner, reacting to bribery allegations made against him on the eve of the 2011 Fifa presidential election, told the Trinidad Express:

“I tell you something, in the next couple days you will see a football tsunami that will hit Fifa and the world that will shock you. The time has come when I must stop playing dead so you’ll see it, it’s coming, trust me you’ll see it by now and Monday. I have been here for 29 consecutive years and if the worst happen, the worst happen.

“I have lived three score and almost ten and my Jack hasn’t been hanged as yet, why should it be hung now? By whom? The American Chuck Blazer? His American lawyer John Collins? Give me a break. I am not the faint-hearted you know ... Let them go ahead, I have no problem with that. But I’ll tell you something, I will hold my head high to the very end because, I repeat here again, I am not guilty of a single iota of wrongdoing.”

When it came, the tsunami attacked his in-house accuser Chuck Blazer; revealed an email sent by Jérôme Valcke in which Valcke referred to Qatar having “bought the WC” – Valcke said later he was misinterpreted – and accused Blatter of apportioning Fifa funds for his own political ends in the final weeks before the election.

Warner wrote: “I also indicated that at the Miami Concacaf Congress on 3 May Mr Blatter made a gift of $1m to Concacaf to spend as it deems fit. This annoyed [Uefa’s] president Michel Platini who was present and he approached Valcke complaining that Mr Blatter had no permission from the finance committee to make this gift, to which Jérôme replied he will find the money for Mr Blatter.”

Platini said he had been having “a joke”; everyone accused denied wrongdoing; and the election went ahead as planned.

(Posted somewhere down this live feed: http://www.theguardian.com/football/liv ... -more-live)

That said, he was probably right in 2011 - but most people ignored him because he's so demonstrably, well, loopy.

If he releases similar information this time around, he'll likely be taken much more seriously.

[The Archregimancy]

One of the extraordinary aspects of this FIFA case for me is that Venezuela - usually one of the first countries to complain about examples of American imperialism - seems to be implicitly supporting the American case in this investigation.

Along with the other members of CONMEBOL, it voted against Blatter in the presidential election - and now this:

Venezuela’s FA headquarters have been raided as part of the investigation, according to Reuters: “Military intelligence raided the headquarters of the FVF on Wednesday as part of a corruption investigation following the arrest of its former president Rafael Esquivel in Switzerland.”

(Again, scroll down the Guardian live feed)

[Ifreann]

Fifa crisis: Jack Warner 'to reveal all despite fears'

Shit has gotten real.

You can leave your hat on, Mr. Warner.

---

One of the extraordinary aspects of this FIFA case for me is that Venezuela - usually one of the first countries to complain about examples of American imperialism - seems to be implicitly supporting the American case in this investigation.

Along with the other members of CONMEBOL, it voted against Blatter in the presidential election - and now this:

Venezuela’s FA headquarters have been raided as part of the investigation, according to Reuters: “Military intelligence raided the headquarters of the FVF on Wednesday as part of a corruption investigation following the arrest of its former president Rafael Esquivel in Switzerland.”

(Again, scroll down the Guardian live feed)

Football: Bringing people together.

[Eastfield Lodge]

Chuck Blazer's testimony unsealed. Biggest bombshell: France bought the 98 World Cup hosting rights.

EDIT:
To clarify, Blazer says he took bribes in deciding that host vote, not specifically mentioning who they were from.

'Twas for Morocco's bid, according to the BBC.

[The Archregimancy]

Football: Bringing people together.

Including you lovely Irish people:

Some intriguing news coming out of Ireland now. John Delaney, the chief executive of the Football Association of Ireland, has apparently been on Irish radio revealing that his organisation received five million euros from Fifa in 2009 in the wake of Thierry Henry’s infamous handball to avoid any legal action. Daniel O’Donnell of the Irish Independent writes on Twitter …

John Delaney confirms that FIFA paid FAI €5 million in 2009 after the Thierry Henry handball so they wouldn't proceed with a legal case.

Same Guardian feed as before (though the most recent story as of this typing)

[The Archregimancy]

And beautifully timed (really, a satirist couldn't make this up), the new film United Passions - starring Tim Roth as our hero Sepp Blatter - has now been released and reviewed.

To the surprise of just about no one, it seems to be truly dire.

"Two hours of wretched, self-congratulatury Fifa history is disastrous cinema, but valuable proof of corporate insanity"

[Vassenor]

So is that their Triumph of the Will, if you forgive the analogy?