Keir RADNEDGE

Infantino – a victim of his own ambition?

Gianni Infantino’s worst enemy as world football supremo is not Swiss justice or any disaffected European. It is his own haste to make his mark.

FIFA presidents do not, traditionally, lose their grip on the job. The levers are too powerful. In 116 years only nine men have wielded that power. Three of them (Daniel Woolfall, Arthur Drewry and Rodolfe Seeldrayers) died in office; one stepped down because he was too busy in his day job (journalist Robert Guerin in1906); and two retired due to old age costing them their touch (Jules Rimet and Joao Havelange).

Only one, Sir Stanley Rous in 1974, was tragically voted out of office. Few in the UK now know of the key role played by the former top referee and FA secretary in turning