Platini: England bid not damaged

UEFA president Michel Platini does not think the screening of the BBC’s controversial Panorama episode will hurt England’s 2018 World Cup bid.

The current affairs programme’s investigative report into alleged corruption of top FIFA officials involved in the World Cup voting process went to air on Monday night in the United Kingdom, and was scathing in its appraisal of the organisation.

With voting to determine the hosts of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups taking place on Thursday, Panorama levelled fresh corruption claims against African confederation president Issa Hayatou, Brazil’s Ricardo Terra Teixeira and Paraguay’s Nicolas Leoz.

But Platini said he did not think the programme’s airing would have a significant bearing on voters, instead claiming a long history of anti-FIFA sentiment from the UK could influence the result.

“I don’t think this programme will have an effect, no – but I think what may affect the decision is the atmosphere going back a long time and what people have been writing about FIFA in the British press for many years,” Platini said.

A statement from the England 2018 bid organisers distanced themselves from the programme, labelling it an ’embarrassment to the BBC’, but the broadcaster responded with a statement of their own.

“The programme is in the public interest and shows that some FIFA executives involved in making decisions about the 2018 bid have a history of taking bribes – and that FIFA has consistently failed to act,” a BBC spokesman said.

“Delay until after the bid was not an option once it became clear that the winning nations might have been chosen by officials with a proven track record of corruption.”