Outgoing FIFA president, Sepp Blatter, has said there was no fixing for the 2022 World Cup, because “you cannot buy a World Cup”.
Blatter, who has been banned for eight years from football-related activities, however admits that political influence saw the Gulf nation win the rights.
In an interview with The Times, the Swiss claimed that then-French president Nicolas Sarkozy told Platini to change his vote.
Blatter said: “You cannot buy a World Cup, it will go at the end where the higher political influences are. For World Cup 2022, Platini at least had the courtesy to phone me and say, ‘now we have had a meeting with the head of state and if the head of state is asking me to support France for different reasons then I will’. He was very correct, he phoned me and said my vote will not be for the Americans.
“He said if a head of state is asking you, you can still say yes or no, but in the interests of France…I knew then there would be a problem, we tried but it was too late. It was one week or 10 days before the vote. I tried to see what votes were left for the US but four votes were lost.”
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