Big enough news for its own thread. http://www.bbc.com/sport/0/football/34657900 Suspended Fifa president Sepp Blatter has suggested there was an agreement in place for Russia to host the 2018 World Cup - before the vote took place. He also said a late swing in the voting towards Qatar undid a similar agreement to give the 2022 World Cup to the USA. Asked whether it was a mistake to award the 2018 and 2022 tournaments simultaneously, Blatter replied: "It was agreed that we go to Russia because it's never been in Russia, eastern Europe, and for 2022 we go back to America."
Since we are dealing with Sepp and tranlation to Russian and then English, I'm assuming, they thought there was a general consensus that the cups would go there - until the vote. Just like Congress, it is 'generally known' how a vote will go beforehand. I don't think he is that dumb to say both cups were pre-agreed upon (IE bought).
So...all this stuff is (supposedly) going on and Gulati wouldn't know about it? With the way FIFA operates, people are making the (justified, frankly) association with Gulati, since he's part of FIFA.
Still not following. My understanding is that the US had the best technical bid, and there were significant problems with Australia and the East Asian bids, while Qatar's bid was always laughable on the merits. I recall the consensus being Australia might get it due to never having hosted, or the US might host due to the quality of the bid, with the latter being far more likely. Understanding the facts at hand had nothing to do with criminality or conspiracy or anything like that.
As much as I would like to have Sunil out of office (which is a lot), what Blatter is suggesting doesn't have to mean bribery. I would doubt seriously that Sunil is involved in any financial improprieties. US soccer would have to be involved in such things. I don't find that likely either. It does suggest some sort of voting collusion, which is how these things work, and not likely to be breaking any laws.
I think some of you are trying to find something that isn't there. Like a few others have said, they usually know who's going to win these votes before they happen, so it seems like Blatter is saying that it was assumed that Russia would win 2018 and USA would win 2022, but Qatar swept in late and changed that.
Yeah, it's a reach to criticize Sunil in this instance. They discussed it beforehand. It was agreed based on the arguments that the U.S. had the best case for hosting another World Cup. They went to vote the next day (or whenever), and by that time Qatari royalty dropped numerous bribes on the presidents of Nigeria and other corrupt federations, so that changed the vote. What, should Sunil have stepped up his palm greasing game to counteract the Qatari Federation's? Didn't necessarily need to bribe people much if at all beforehand to get them to come around on the U.S. since '94 is still the most attended World Cup ever, in spite of there being significantly less matches then. There was more legal monetary incentive to do it in the U.S. than anywhere else. Just not enough to outweigh the illegal for Qatar after bribery. This just reinforces Qatar's bid was corrupt, not like we didn't already know that though.
So Sunil can continue to live his jet setting lifestyle, flying all around the world and getting the best seats in the stadium. I doubt he is innocent.
He wasn't in the ExCo at the time. I have no problems with people leveling some anger in Sunil's direction and wanting the administration of the men's program handed off to other, more capable hands. I don't have a problem with people wanting to remove Sunil. But let's complain about what he is actually responsible for. I do lay a whole lot of the blame of the enormous waste of resources that the 2022 bid was at his feet. He seems to have been totally blindsided by the decision, totally taken by shock at just how transparently the graft had simply bought the game lock, stock, and barrel. He needed to figure that out sooner. Not his best moment by long shot.
No this is Blatter trying to say to the US DOJ, "I wanted to give the US the World Cup, really! Go after the French guy if you're pissed off about losing the WC to a desert country in the middle of the summer. I wasn't to blame!! Really!! I, as FIFA president had nothing to do with the process!!!" It's him grasping at any straw that might give him a chance to stay out of the pen. Don't do the crime if you can't do the time.
There's a video at the original link in which Sepp is speaking English, so no translation errors there. Unless there's a translation error between Sepp's brain and his mouth.
I would have loved the US to have won the bid, but I would have been alright had it gone to Australia. That said, if it had to be a middle east nation, it should have gone to Turkey... A nation that isn't the size of Rhode Island and not a Jihadist safe haven.