Australia will not bid for FIFA events until ‘reform’
Asian Cup winners shelve bid to host 2023 Women’s World Cup and call for a overhaul at FIFA HQ.
Football Federation Australia (FFA) is refusing to bid to host any future global football events until there is systemic change at the world governing body FIFA.
Australia hosted the Asian Cup for the first time earlier this year but failed to win the bid for the 2022 World Cup, which was awarded to Qatar with the FFA garnering just one vote in the process.
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It has now shelved its bid for the 2023 Women’s World Cup pending an “overhaul” of FIFA as the global football governing body reels from a corruption scandal.
“In the current volatile environment, FFA can give no consideration to bidding for any FIFA tournament,” the FFA said in a statement.
“FFA has made it clear that major reform is needed. FIFA’s problems are deep-rooted and tangled in a culture that has developed over decades.
“Until such time that the existing governance model is overhauled, it’s hard to imagine the circumstances in which FFA would put Australia forward as a bidding nation.”
Investigations
The bidding process for 2022 is among a number of World Cups under investigation by US and Swiss authorities for bribery allegations.
National police are probing Australia’s 2022 bid which was criticised by FIFA’s own ethics committee last year in a summary of a major investigation into all bidders for the tournament and the 2018 finals awarded to Russia.
FFA president Frank Lowy has been under pressure from local media to step down until Australia’s bid is cleared but insists the country’s bid was clean.
Australia’s sports minister Sussan Ley said last week the government could not consider committing public money toward any future bid overseen by FIFA until major reform of the governance of global football.