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Andy’s Sting In The Tale (13/12/24) “Fifa Grande Fromage Gianni Makes Machiavelli Look Like an Amateur” 

Date: 13th December 2024

(Photo:@Homesoffootball)

This week in Fifaland we’ve first seen a ‘Compromise World Cup’ for 2030 awarded to 6 nations across 3 continents without the suspicion or merest hint of a vote.
It should probably have been awarded to Uruguay on the 100th anniversary and on their initial belief and indeed support that allowed it all to happen.
But Gianni had too many ‘friends’ and godfather-style debts to honour where he had promised to deliver revenue so wasting it all on Uruguay wasn’t going to happen.
So he imagineered ‘a camel of a tournament’. (Fifa is all about money and favours and football is just the cash cow in the byre).

So World Cup 2030 starts in Montevideo and will be a ‘Centenary Celebration’ whatever that will mean.
Then we have some token World Cup 2030 games in Argentina, then Paraguay, basically to knock South America out of any potential bids for the next World Cup in 2034, which Gianni had long promised to his newest and now bestest, bestest pals in Saudi.
(Maybe the seed was planted properly when he, Putin and Bin Salman sat together in the poshest seats at Russia’s World Cup final in 2018).
A live Sportswashing event funded by his then best pals, back in the day, Russia and Gazprom).

(Photo: The Athletic)
Back to 2030 and almost before it has started the World Cup Circus will move to the Iberian Peninsula apart from some token games in Morocco and some jet-lagged footballers.
So in one fell swoop Gianni, like a chess master, rendered all member countries in Europe, South America and Africa ineligible under Fifa rules to bid to host World Cup 2034 leaving it to Saudi. A wee disgrace is his ‘set processes’ only allowed Australia just over 3 weeks to put their possible bid together.
They were never going to be able to do that.
And they wouldn’t have won anyway even if they had.
So on Wednesday 11th December Gianni got the results he wanted as the two Godfathered nomination packages were ‘clapped-through’ by the member munchkins virtually watching and silent.

Apart from 1, our friend Lise.Fair play, Gianni’s first convoluted WC award, to buy-off 6 nations, and 3 continents with a slice of the action was genius.
The second,  a winter tournament to Sportswash his new bestest buddies and new main Fifa sponsors, Saudi Arabia and Aramco was a long done deal.

Insiders say that he had originally promised Saudi the 2030 Cup but when it faced push-back from Latin America and Iberia he recognised the signs.
Our Swiss Machiavelli devotee who also runs Fifa like a wee private ego, and house collecting trip only fights when he knows he can win.

So his gift to the Saudis slid seamlessly back to 2034.
But a forensic fuss has been rooted deep and it will progress in the goldfish bowl under the full glare of world organisations from Amnesty to the Norwegian FA, still angry at what happened in the build up and aftermath of Qatar.

Here are a couple of disturbing facts that are still under-reported.

Fact check: How many people died for the Qatar World Cup? – DW – 11/16/2022– None of the families of the underpaid, immigrant workers who died building the stadia in the rush for Qatar 2022 have been compensated yet.
None.
This is despite a whole load of other Fifa published bollocks about the various unprecedented successes of the tournament.

– In 2022, Saudi Sports Minister, Prince Abdulaziz bin Turki Al Faisal was reported in Sky News saying, “It is Islamophobic to require our country to lift some of our cultural restrictions if we hosted a World Cup. If you are against that and don’t feel like you are going to enjoy coming, and you can’t respect that rule, then don’t come.
It is as simple as that”.

(Don’t skip that bit because it says what it says).

One Country Spoke Out Because Lise Klaveness Has Cojones

BBC World Service - World Football, Lise Klaveness and her UEFA ambitionsIn a formal letter, The NFF is demanding greater transparency, fairness and stricter adherence to Fifa’s 2016 reforms relating to good governance and transparent World Cup allocations.

The English FA gave Fifa their support as did the SFA at a very late 11th hour.

Our quickly tarnishing Prime Minister Sir Keir Someone, happened to be in Saudi and said, “UK jobs depend on a good relationship with the Kingdom”.
He’s right economically.

After last week’s blog I was invited on to Stephen Jardine’s radio show after all the low level media chatter/stooshie that will soon dissipate if it hasn’t already until it resurfaces.

Stephen asked me if this all means that Football Has Just Sold Out?

World Cup 2022: Why is the World Cup in Qatar so controversial? - BBC NewsroundI answered that none of this is new, Russia, Qatar and Saudi are just what happens and it’s all about following the money.
I also said that “once ‘Football breaks out wherever and whenever that all the politics gets forgotten’ because that’s what happens.That’s why the Infantinos and Ceferins get away with all the shenanigans and politics and nest lining”.

And the reason guys like us and Spain and Belgium and Portugal and Greece sit on our hands and say nothing is because self-interest tells us waiting to get as big a share of the Fifa monies as we can is the smartest move.

Anyway.
We are now already more interested in today’s tough and messy draw for the next World Cup than Infantino’s plotting for his next WC gift after Saudi.
Be sure, very sure that plotting and dealing is already underway.

Scotland National Team on X: "We've been drawn in Group C for @FIFAWorldCup qualifying: / Portugal or Denmark Greece Scotland Belarus https://t.co/uIlripwlEp" / X
A Tough World Cup Draw for Steve
Portugal (6) or more likely Denmark (21)
Greece (39)
Belarus (98)

Scotland (45)

Yes it can always be worse but Greece are feisty and trips to Belarus never easy but as a counterbalance none of them will have wanted us.

Andy’s Sting in the Tale

1. Europe After Xmas
2. ‘Club World Cup’ Shenanigans before a ball is kicked
3. Unsung Community Coaches and Charities
4. Just What Would it Take to Clean Up Fifa?

 

1. Two Missed Opportunities and a Cracker of a Final On the Cards


Europa League: Rangers v Tottenham Hotspur - score & match stats - BBC Sport - BBC SportYou can tell how much better the performances of our big two Glasgow clubs have been in Europe because both Celtic’s away draw in Croatia, and Rangers home draw against Postecoglou’s Spurs were disappointments.
Hearts never turned up and now need to be beat ‘Petrocub-Hincesti’. They are from Moldova and have 1 point after 5 games.
Hearts need to win for a chance to get into the play offs.
Celtic host, so far pointless, Young Boys on 22nd January and then have a tough trip to Villa when they will probably still be looking for points.Rangers have a tough journey to ‘Old Trafford on Jan 23 and then host mid table Union SG from Belgium on the 30th.
All to play for.

Good luck to all three.

Dinamo Zagreb 0-0 Celtic: Analysis - BBC SportAnd please Celtic and Rangers fans listen to your clubs, your managers, your players and fans who don’t need the smoke and the behavioural nonsense.

Flares have no place in football and they can be lethal as one Greek Policeman sadly found out.

Let the cup final be a cracker because of the football.

2. Infantino Returns Favours
Club World Cup 2025: Full list of qualified teams & how qualification works for revamped FIFA tournament | Goal.com USWhat do you do?

When you have a new competition that isn’t?
When even putting your name twice on your special new trophy doesn’t mean that the Toyota World Club Cup never existed?
When you have to invite clubs with fan followings rather than the top teams of the moment to your wee cup?
When you want $4 Billions, for the media package and wearily knock back a $1B offer and then have to do a sideways deal with your new Saudi pals to get less than the money you rejected through a media company, DAZN who the Saudis have just given the money to in a token investment?
What do you do to ensure Real will really come? (Money and more money up front and more than others get offered)
And when someone and some sponsors in America has been so helpful why wouldn’t any Fifa exec not promise them not just 1 tournament but 2 with the next in 2029 already a makeweight in the next round of media dealings?It will be interesting and entertaining to see how he finagles it but finagle it Gianni will and you read it here.

3. Football, a Power of good in our Communities

Well done SPFL Trust

SPFL Trust's Game Energy opening community hubs to help tackle fuel poverty | STV NewsA feelgood story from the unsung SPFL trust from Pittodrie and countless other places in Scotland.
The fans food banks, the Xmas donations and all the good community stuff is heartwarming from fans all over the country.

I don’t have the skills to reset the NHS but wherever it or the various linked charities goes the football community is a natural health link partner from cradle to grave.
And from a lifetime in marketing I know it reaches people that advertising can’t.

Football and health go together and I know that from personal experience.

Today’s story is about ‘Prostate Football Fans in Training’ and it should be happening wherever there is a club with a hall and men with Prostate Cancer Issues, or women with Breast Cancer issues.
Richard Donaldson, aged 55 is one of 16 men who recently completed the ‘Varied Health Programme’ at Pittodrie a 12 week course.
His story is not just heartwarming it is screaming to be upscaled all over the country.

That needs to happen.

4. The Last Fifa Rebellion Led to ‘No Vote’

A final word on the Fifa bombardment of excrement this week.

Russia were excluded from international football after Fifa read the room not long after Putin’s invasion.
But an agreed back door deal with his Gazprom Vice President to allow Russian ‘age groups’ under 17 to continue to compete was done and being presented as a fait accompli.It was just going to happen.

Denmark, England, Finland, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway and Poland led an active proposed boycott. (We were silent)

The idea was dropped and off the agenda.
No vote, no procession, no young Russian teams back-door.

This is no surprise to anyone.
We all know Fifa and Uefa run themselves any which way because they can and do.
It’s all about power and money and power and money.

They pay amazingly well too if you have a job there.

And they as organisations do good for sure but that doesn’t make then benign or a power for good.

Andy’s Album of the Week

Por Pedro Martinez Losa (who got his jotters today because it is always easier to sack the manager than change the real reasons we underperformed in Hampden and Helsinki.

Buena Vista Social Club

Buena Vista Social Club (album) - WikipediaI was gifted this album as a ‘Secret Santa’ office present in the late 90s.
I still don’t know who by and also had never heard of the album.
It was in my ‘to try’ pile in my car glove compartment a month later when on a long journey my passenger gave it its premiere.
The first track ‘Chan Chan’ nailed it for me.
I played the album on repeat the rest of the journey and back.
A great album from out of the blue and quite different.
If you play it don’t listen too hard and just let it flow over you a couple of times.

The back story is it came from a project by British producer Nick Gold.
He invited his pal, Ry Cooder, to Havana originally to record a fusion album with Cuban musicians and two African musicians from Mali.
Ry had to get into Cuba via Mexico to avoid USA travel nonsenses but the Mali guys ended up un-visa-ed and no shows in the recording studio.
So now instead we have an album of Cuban ‘son’* music meeting Ry Cooder, and an English producer.
It was all recorded in a week with over 20 seasoned Cuban musicians.
None of them aspirational pop stars.

A really fine album that I hadn’t played for a couple of years but thanks to Clive Myrie on his wonderful Caribbean series for nudging me by featuring some of the tracks.

*Son Cubano blends Spanish and African with guitar meeting bongos and maracas.

Salsa is a direct descendant, (music and dance not sauce).


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