UEFA planning criminal claim against FIFA boss over World Cup proposal

The European governing body of football, UEFA, is preparing a criminal complaint against the embattled FIFA president, Gianni Infantino, over a scrapped plan to sell commercial stakes in the World Cup to private investors. Infantino and a small group of advisers had been secretly preparing the controversial privatisation scheme for over a year, according to documents lodged in US courts.

UEFA claims that the low valuation of the stakes offered to private backers was absurd and not independently evaluated, implying an enterprise value of only approximately $20 billion. Infantino pushed the plan through internal FIFA approval without proper due diligence, creating a permanent financial interest in FIFA's commercial arm for investors at an absurdly low price.

UEFA has demanded an independent probe into the formation of the scheme, alleging that Infantino's actions have caused direct and concrete injury to FIFA's reputation, governance authority, and commercial relationships.