U.S. prosecutors plunged the World Cup’s governing body into crisis, charging nine officials with corruption as Europe’s largest soccer federation called for postponing this week’s FIFA election for president.
Earlier today, Swiss police entered the luxury Baur au Lac hotel in Zurich and arrested seven FIFA officials. Switzerland is probing whether anyone broke laws in awarding upcoming tournaments to Russia and Qatar. Two former soccer executives were also charged in New York, as were four sports marketing officials.Well, come on now. The World Cup is ordinarily played in the summertime. The average temperature in July in Qatar is quite comfortable, as the accompanying graph indicates:
The Justice Department vowed more arrests in a widening probe of racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering.
“They were expected to uphold the rules that keep soccer honest, and protect the integrity of the game,” U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said in a news conference. “Instead, they corrupted the business of worldwide soccer to serve their interests and enrich themselves.”
Excellent weather for soccer. Hard to imagine that it would take any bribery for FIFA officials to award the World Cup to what is such an obvious place to spend the summer.
I expect we'll see something similar regarding the Olympics shortly. Why would that be?
2 comments:
FIFA is just a warm-up for the Olympics. Now, if Justice could only get interested in that other event that takes place every four years: U.S. Presidential elections.
And while we're at it, how about the way Super Bowls are awarded?
I had the same question with Qatar. 100 in the shade and soccer? Wasn't Brazil bad enough at 75-80 degrees? I remember vividly a time when some fool scheduled the 2 mile run first at a track meet on a 95 degree day. It would have been brutal enough a few hours later at 85F, but those idiots obviously had never done eight laps around a track on a hot day.
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