European soccer cries foul over World Cup sell-off plan

The governing body of European soccer, UEFA, has reacted angrily to a plan by Gianni Infantino, president of the sport's world governing body FIFA, to set up a company involving private investors to run soccer's biggest competition, the World Cup.

The 2026 tournament was recently held in Canada, Mexico and the United States, but with most games, including the final, taking place in the US, it was seen as a US-dominated tournament.

There was fury when having already been given the previously non-existent FIFA Peace Prize, US President Donald Trump intervened after a US player was suspended for a vital match, with the suspension being deferred, and now it has emerged that the proposed company would involve the brother of Trump's son-in-law.

FIFA's plan is for a company handling commercial rights, called FIFA Forward Enterprise, or FFE, valued at around $20 billion, with $4.2 billion being raised by the sale of minority, non-controlling stakes. The investor group for FFE is set to be led by Thrive Eternal, a company founded by Joshua Kushner, who is the brother of President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, according to The Independent report.

FIFA says this would deliver in excess of $10 billion of what it called "football development funding" before the next men's World Cup.

Infantino said he wants the sport's global popularity and huge commercial success to benefit "the whole game… our next stage of growth needs a structure built for it, one where the commercial side of the game operates as a focused, dedicated business, with its value shared more and better all around the world."

A crisis meeting of European football chiefs will take place later in the week, with some people suggesting UEFA member associations should boycott FIFA competitions. With six of the eight quarter-finalists at this year's World Cup being UEFA countries, and the next multi-venue men's World Cup in 2030 being staged mainly in Spain and Portugal, this would be severely damaging.

A statement issued by UEFA said the suggestion "crosses a line that football's governing institutions should never cross" and that the "soul and governance of football are not assets to trade…none of us are the owners of football. It is not FIFA's to sell."

Relations between the two governing bodies are already fraught, with UEFA chief Aleksander Ceferin having declined to attend the recent World Cup final, which saw Spain beat Argentina 1-0, in protest at several governance issues, including Trump's interference over the US player suspension.

The governing body of soccer in England, the Football Association, said it had not seen any "substantive detail", but "based on the limited information, we are deeply concerned about the lack of process and governance to get to this point, and the apparent substance and principles involved."

A statement from CONCACAF, the Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football, to the Guardian newspaper expressed similar fears.

"We are deeply concerned by the lack of due process," it said. "We share the disappointment of many within our region and the game that this level of detail has been designed and shared publicly before any discussion with the relevant governance bodies and stakeholders has taken place."