Ceferin says Infantino must remember he is European after World Cup stake plan
On 23 August 2026 Uefa president Aleksander Ceferin told the Rest is Politics podcast that Gianni Infantino must remember he is European after describing Infantino's plan to sell a stake in the World Cup as "worse than the Super League".
Earlier this month Fifa abandoned Infantino's proposal to create a new company, Fifa Forward Enterprise (FFE), to manage the commercial and ticketing rights of all Fifa competitions, with 21% to be sold to a private investment company. Uefa led opposition to the plan, its members voted to boycott World Cups unless it was scrapped, the governing body said it had lost confidence in Infantino, and the football associations of all the home nations withdrew support for the 56-year-old Swiss.
"I think this plan is even worse than the Super League plan," Ceferin said on the Rest is Politics podcast. "Super important clubs wanted to do their own league, which is wrong, and would destroy football. But in this case, football would be literally sold. "I'm absolutely sure that the plan is dead. It's hard to to imagine what kind of people would sell the sport that belongs to everyone. We will not allow that to happen."
Ceferin said Uefa had no prior knowledge of Infantino's plan and that he learned of it through the media while on holiday with his family. "He didn't contact me since this happened," Ceferin said. "They [Fifa] play on, you know, '[how] arrogant Europe is against us: They have enough money, but I help the small and the poor'. "But I think someone should remind him that he is a European, and that he was supported by Uefa, which he forgot."
The Uefa president noted Infantino's long association with European football, saying the Fifa chief had worked at Uefa for 16 years and was general secretary for nine. Ceferin also outlined Infantino's recent efforts to drum up support, reporting that on Saturday he met Caribbean Football Union members in the Dominican Republic and on Sunday attended the E-Sports World Cup in Paris, an event also attended by French President Emmanuel Macron, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Portugal forward Cristiano Ronaldo.
Ceferin criticised what he described as growing pressure around Infantino's external relationships, citing an episode involving United States President Donald Trump and a World Cup disciplinary decision. After US striker Folarin Balogun had a red card suspension overturned so that he could play in his side's defeat by Belgium in the last 16 of this summer's World Cup, Trump revealed he personally called Infantino to request the sanction be lifted, and earlier this month Trump said it would be a "terrible mistake" to remove Infantino as Fifa president.
"That was more than shocking. We have rules, and if you don't respect your own rules, then the game doesn't make any sense," Ceferin said on the incident. "The president of a country says: 'I called him, and I told him to look at it.' And then the Fifa president says it was an independent decision. "I mean, for us as football fans, or for us as a governing body, that's shocking. That's shocking, and - trust me - almost everybody was shocked. Just not everybody dared to speak."
Ceferin confirmed he will not stand to become Fifa president at the Fifa Congress in March 2027, when Infantino will look to secure a fourth term. "I'm not interested because of two reasons. One reason is that I love Uefa and I love working here, and I think that at a certain point it's time also to enjoy life a bit," the 58-year-old Slovenian said. "And the second point is, my credibility is much, much, much higher if I'm not interested in the position."
