Infantino Says 'Vast, Vast Majority' Backs Him but Gives No Date for Releasing World Cup Sell-Off Documents

Since two months ago, when the heads of UEFA, the Asian Football Confederation and Concacaf signed a letter accusing him of breaking trust "through deception" over the FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) plan, Gianni Infantino has gone from facing calls to resign to publicly projecting calm. On Saturday, Oct. 24, he told BBC Sport at the Under-15 World Cup in Baku, Azerbaijan, that he has the "vast, vast majority" of world football behind him.

He also laughed off questions about whether he had considered resigning.

The documents question

The most concrete issue in the interview was the paperwork. Last week UEFA demanded that FIFA release all key documents on FFE by Nov. 2. UEFA general secretary Theodore Theodoridis said FIFA had failed to address "a number of fundamental questions."

At the FIFA Council meeting last week, Infantino apologised for the "communication and consultation" around FFE. Council members told him he was not "fit to be Fifa president" if he did not provide the documents they had requested, including the rationale for the plan.

Asked by the BBC when those papers would arrive, Infantino gave no date. He said the release had to follow a "legal process" and that FIFA was "working on it."

"We'll answer of course all the questions that are asked as far as the process allows, as far as we can," he said.

European delegates who attended the Council meeting said they left disappointed at what they saw as a lack of clarity, even after the apology.

What FFE was

Under FFE, a portion of the commercial rights to FIFA-run competitions would have been sold to a private investment firm, through a commercial subsidiary. Infantino scrapped the plan within days. It had already angered soccer leaders in Europe, North America and Asia.

The World Cup stake sale was the core of the dispute behind the letter from UEFA, the AFC and Concacaf.

Infantino's argument

Infantino's defense rests on the size of his electorate. "I was elected by 211 member associations from all over the world," he said. He framed disagreement as a normal part of an organization that large.

"There is nothing bad in disagreeing," he said. "It's OK to disagree. It's OK to have different points of view, but then we need to be able to move on."

He also invoked democracy directly. "If we are serious about that, then we need to respect as well the views of the vast, vast majority," he said.

He pointed to his recent travel as evidence. "I'm just coming back off Tokyo where the Asian Football Confederation has fully endorsed me," he said. "I was in Cape Verde where all African countries have endorsed me. I'm speaking to all associations everywhere in the world."

Since the letter, he has also appeared in Morocco and the Dominican Republic. He has proposed raising the money FIFA distributes for football development worldwide by $3.4bn (£2.6bn).

The numbers that decide this

The AFC's endorsement came on Friday, Oct. 23. That was a reversal for the confederation, whose president, Sheikh Salman, had been one of the signatories of the trust letter. BBC Sport described the turnaround as a U-turn and said Infantino's re-election now "looks inevitable." That is the BBC's assessment, not a result.

The formal calendar is short:

• Nov. 2: UEFA's deadline for FIFA to release the FFE documents.
• Nov. 18: deadline for any rival candidate to come forward.
• March: the FIFA election, where Infantino is seeking a fourth term. The Associated Press describes it as his final one.

No rival candidate is named in the material so far. UEFA and Concacaf have not said they have withdrawn their objections. UEFA's demand is specifically about transparency, not only about who holds the presidency.

What is still open

Infantino's backers can point to two confederations' public endorsements and his 211-association mandate. His critics inside the Council and at UEFA are asking for something narrower: the documents explaining how a plan to sell part of the World Cup's commercial rights was drawn up and why. Infantino has said FIFA is working through a legal process. He has not said what that process is or when it ends.

The next test comes on Nov. 2. If FIFA misses UEFA's deadline, European football's governing body will have to decide whether to take its objection beyond letters before candidates close their filings sixteen days later.