Fifa 2022 Row: Sponsers Seek Probe

Visa and Adidas, following Sony, said that allegations engulfing the award of the 2022 tournament to Qatar are damaging to the global reputation of the game, the Guardian Newspaper reported on Sunday.

Adidas, which recently renewed its sponsorship until 2030 and is Fifa’s longest serving partner, said: “The negative tenor of the public debate around Fifa at the moment is neither good for football nor for Fifa and its partners.”

On Saturday, Sony had said it expected Fifa to ensure the disclosures are “investigated appropriately”.

The sponsors spoke out following new revelations in the Sunday Times regarding the activities of Mohamed Bin Hammam, the Qatari former Fifa executive committee member – who was also formerly the Asian Football Confederation president – and his alleged links to the successful Qatar 2022 bid.

The Sunday Times reports, based on a cache of millions of documents detailing the activities of Bin Hammam in the runup to the vote in December 2010, outlined allegations that he used a $5m slush fund and his influence to pay bribes and coordinate global trade deals for the bid.

The Qatar 2022 organising committee insists that Bin Hammam, who quit football after an attempt to unseat Sepp Blatter as Fifa president was derailed by bribery allegations in 2011, had no “official or unofficial” role in winning the bid.

Collectively, all of Fifa’s sponsors contribute $1.5bn (£900m) over a four-year World Cup cycle.

The disclosure has cast an air of gloom over the 2014 edition of the tournament which starts on 12 th June, Thursday.

interactive editor