The choice for Qatar to host the 2022 World Cup “was a mistake 12 years ago,” Switzerland’s FIFA president Sepp Blatter said on Tuesday, who was cleared by a court of financial misconduct in July.
Sepp Blatter, 86, addressed another meeting between then-French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, and then-UEFA official, Michel Platini, to influence key votes for Qatar’s choice.
“It’s too small a country” [o menor em tamanho desde a Suíça em 1954]Joseph Blatter said of Qatar in an interview with the Swiss communications group Tamedia (TX Group), adding that “football and the World Cup are too big for that”.
The 32 teams, including Portugal, in Group H, which includes Uruguay, Ghana and South Korea, will play 64 matches in eight stadiums in the city of Doha, which has been transformed since 2010 by major construction projects to prepare for the world.
“It was a bad choice. And I was responsible for that as president at the time,” said Blatter, who has long said he voted for the United States, one of five candidates defeated by Qatar in the final ballot. .
Blatter again recalled a meeting the week before the vote between UEFA president and FIFA vice-president Michel Platini at the official residence of then-president Sarkozy, which was also attended by the crown prince of Qatar, now emir. , Tamim bin Hamad al-Dan me.
Blatter reiterated that Sarkozy had pressured Platini and reiterated his version of a phone call the former France international made to him after the Paris meeting, noting that the voting plan for the World Cup had been changed.
🇧🇷Thanks to the four voices of Platini and his team [UEFA], the 2022 World Cup went to Qatar and not to the United States. It’s the truth,” Joseph Blatter said of the 8-14 vote.
In criticizing the choice of Qatar, the former Swiss sports official never specifically referred to labor and human rights issues in the emirate, which have been raised by various organizations since 2010.
Source: DN
