[ 2016-12-06 ]

Sepp Blatter loses his appeal against six-year ban from football
Sepp Blatter has lost his appeal at the court of
arbitration for sport against a six-year ban from
football.

Blatter said in a statement on Monday it is
“difficult” to accept but that “the way the
case progressed, no other verdict could be
expected”.

The former Fifa president, who was banned for
approving a £1.35m payment to Michel Platini in
2011, said he will accept the decision.

“I have experienced much in my 41 years in Fifa.
I mostly learned that you can win in sport, but
you can also lose,” Blatter said.

''Nevertheless I look back with gratitude to all
the years, in which I was able to realise my
ideals for football and serve Fifa.''

The verdict ends Blatter’s hopes of becoming
honorary president of football’s governing body
which he left in disgrace. Blatter could have
appealed against the Cas ruling to Switzerland’s
supreme court. It can annul verdicts if legal
process was abused.

Still, his legal problems are far from over.
Blatter, 80, now faces a separate Fifa ethics
investigation into suspected bribery linked to
multimillion-dollar bonuses in top executives’
contracts. Swiss prosecutors also opened criminal
proceedings against Blatter for the Platini
payment, and a sale of World Cup television
rights. Blatter denies any wrongdoing.

Blatter said on Monday that it was
“incomprehensible” that his claim of having a
verbal agreement in 1998 was not accepted “in
spite of my testimony to the contrary and the
testimony given by other witnesses”.

The court of arbitration for sport was judging
whether Blatter was guilty of unethically offering
a cash gift and conflict of interest with Platini,
who was a Fifa vice-president in 2011.

Blatter and Platini both said the £1.35m was
uncontracted salary based on a verbal agreement
more than a decade earlier. From 1999 to 2002, the
former France player was the newly elected
Blatter’s presidential adviser.

However, their explanation of a salary deal was
doubted by Fifa’s ethics judges, and by the
three-member Cas panel on Monday. “The payment
amounted to an undue gift as it had no contractual
basis,” Cas said in a statement.

The Fifa ethics committee investigated after the
payment emerged in September 2015 during a wider
Swiss federal probe of alleged corruption linked
to Fifa.

Blatter and Platini – whose Fifa presidential
bid was stalled, then ended, by the case – were
banned from football duty for eight years in
December last year. The Fifa appeal committee cut
two years from both men’s bans as “appropriate
recognition” for their long service.

After a separate Cas appeal hearing, Platini’s
ban was reduced in May to four years, ensuring he
lost the Uefa presidency. When Blatter’s case
came to the Cas in August, Platini testified on
his behalf during a 14-hour hearing.

Source - Soccernet

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