For those who have missed it, the head of the English Football Association has just resigned after being taped secretly by a woman-friend, speaking about how the Spanish football authorities were trying to bribe referees in the upcoming World Cup.
Thoughts on the affair from the least to the most important:
What ever happened to being a lady? Crikey! Who would date a modern-day English woman? They have come a long way from their mothers’ generation. Now they don’t seem to be able to go out with a sports person unless armed with tape recorders and hidden cameras. And then they rush around to all the tabloid newspapers desperate to sell their stories. It is an odd generation that thinks that is acceptable behaviour.
Skewed morals; “Our top priority as a new Government is to win this bid for the country and I am delighted they have acted as quickly and decisively as they have done,” says the UK’s new sports minister Hugh Robertson, after hearing that Lord Triesman had resigned and that the English FA had written letters of apology to the Spanish and Russian Football Associations.
Ahh, your top priority is what!? Your immediate reaction upon hearing a senior executive speak about possible corruption is to praise the fellow’s resignation, write groveling letters and generally sucking up to people in an unconvincing manner? Let’s see, what other ‘top priorities’ sports fans may want. How about calling for an inquiry to see if what he said – about corruption at the highest levels of the sport – is actually true?
Here are two additional reasons to be concerned. In the conversation, Lord Triesman does not say much about how the alleged bribery would be conducted, but the essential manner of corruption of top officials at an international tournament is one we have all witnessed before – remember the Salt Lake City Olympics of 2002? What was the trail of corruption there? Russian mobsters who were connected to top Russian sports officials were instrumental in arranging the fixes. Is this the same method that Triesman was alleging was to occur in this World Cup in the possible bribing of referees?
Finally, why will FIFA not establish an integrity unit? UEFA has implemented such a team. It is allegations like this that are the exact reason why an integrity unit needs to be put into place. This is Caesar’s wife time – it is not simply that the referees must be honest, they must be seen to be honest.
Declan,
A few weeks ago rumours spread that you were about to drop a bombshell. Is this (part of) it?
BBC is reporting that FIFA is investigating. Sadly, it appears to be investigating the FA and how they’ve handled theTriesman affair, not the allegations themselves. Typical, huh?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/8688388.stm
SB
Declan;
I came upon you on Fox Football Fone In, you were doing the rounds promoting your book. Being a Yank, who lived in England for five years as a kid, I fell in love with English Football. I finally found your book having tried to find in bookstores and read it. I must say, your book was not only intriguing, frightening, and also angered as a sports fan that fixing has gone on in the sports for years.
Having lived in England I did become fond of the country and I would love to see England host the World Cup in the near future, what bothers me here is that if Lord Triesman knows something about bribing, then the FA should take the risk for the good of the game and let him speak out to clean up the game. I guess it bothers me that the FA are far too worried about not only their reputations, but getting the World Cup in the first place. Personally even if this hadn’t come out England would not have gotten the bid anyway, because it has always been apparent to me that Sepp Blatter does not like England for whatever reason. That’s my take on it.
Dear Bishopville Red and Peter,
Actually FIFA will not be investigating whether Lord Triesman was telling the truth. What their ethics committee will be doing is investigating whether his comments will effect the 2018 World Cup bid of England.
The institution that has been charged with investigating is the United Nations of policing – Interpol. Don’t get me wrong: nice guys. Pleasant. Sympathetic. Kindly. But efficient investigators? Not at all. Not because they are not good cops, but by the very nature of Interpol (an international agency) they cannot do good investigations, rather they “collect” information from other police forces. Then they write memos and reports.
What is needed is an international sports agency tasked with fighting corruption. It cannot be run by and for the gambling industry. It must be independent and it must have the resources to do proper investigations or we will see the credibility of sports tarnished forever.
Best wishes to you both,
Declan
Given the number of high profile sexual assaults, run-of-the-mill assaults, and various other sundry crimes involving footballers (both international and North American), basketball players, and various other sports athletes, I’d feel a woman dating any sports/entertainment celebrity WITHOUT a recording/taping/back-up to be a silly woman indeed.
Police and Courts have shown, repeatedly, that when its a “he-said/she-said” affair, if you are a celebrity, you can just about get away with murder.
Crikey! What ever happened to these sports figures behaving like gentlemen, not sex-addicted perverts, violent neanderthal thugs, or both at the same time? They are a far cry from their fathwers generation!
As for corruption, it is harder for a large international body to tackle it, because it means admitting it happened in the past. That means throwing all past results on the fire as being potentially corrupt. And that will hit your bottom line. Better, from their perspective, to sweep it under the rug and deal secretly and privately with those who are known to be a problem.
It is, of course, precisely this problem that led the Olympics into the drug scandal in the 80s and 90s, since they ignored it for so long it became rampant. God I hope Usain Bolt remains clean. Nice to see someone do something athletically great and not be doped to the gills.
There’s no reason not to other than inertia and a fear of having how corrupt their sport has been for precisely how long exposed. That affects bottom lines and leads to people being canned.
That fans knew how doped the Olympics and amateur sport were speaks to how heads-in-sand the Olympics officials were. Most fans are aware that international soccer is a huge betting event, and that unsavory interests make massive amounts of money from it, and thus would like to make more by fixing the outcomes. It is a truely naive sports fan that doesn’t see there MUST be some amount of fixing somewhere.
That FIFA and the others can’t see that…well, like any large corp, acting quickly and efficiently isn’t their strong suit, and admitting fault is anathema. Notice how hard BP are working to avoid as much guilt/blame/responsibility as possible, even though they are caught red-handed and everyone with 1/4 a brain knows it.
Dear Brian,
A great set of comments. Intelligent and you made me laugh. Fair point and well-written.
Cheers,
Declan