Blatter to Appeal to CAS Over Eight Year Suspension From Football

By Christian Radnedge

Sepp Blatter has confirmed that he will appeal to the court of arbitration for sport to overturn his eight year suspension from all football related activity that was handed down to him by FIFA’s ethics committee on Monday.

In a press conference in Zurich, link the beleaguered outgoing chief of world football struck a defiant figure and repeatedly protested his innocence despite the ban for a “disloyal payment” of CHF2m to Michel Platini in 2011.

Frenchman Platini also found himself suspended from football for eight years for his alleged part in the scandal.

“We had a oral contract, sales a gentleman’s agreement, allergy ” Blatter said of the payment in question. “This was made in 1998 after the World Cup. What astonished me now when I talk about the decision today is that they deny the existence of such an agreement. This agreement was confirmed by two meetings. We have the proof that this agreement existed.

“Therefore the 2m Swiss francs paid to Platini went through the finance committee, the executive committee and was done in good terms. This is a donation. This is a gift. We avoided the issue of corruption. We did this because this arrangement was in the FIFA books. You can have oral contracts.

“Once again we go to the appeal committee. We go to CAS, the Court of Arbitration for Sport. There might have been an administrative error, but this was nothing to do with the ethics. This cannot be proven. If it cannot be proven, then it cannot be guilty.”

Blatter added he wants to clear his name in time to preside over the extraordinary elective congress which will pick his successor in Zurich on February 26; Platini meanwhile wants to be back in that election race.

The 79-year-old suggested he was being victimised and even spoke of his dismay that members of his family had been tarnished because of the allegations.

Blatter said he was not ashamed, but that he did regret the situation which has seen several officials linked to FIFA arrested and charged in respective investigations into corruption in world football by the US department of justice and Swiss authorities.

“I’m really sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry that I am still somewhere a punching ball. As president of FIFA, I’m still this punching ball. I’m sorry for FIFA. I’m sorry for football. I’m also sorry about me. How I am treated in this world.

{jcomments on}