Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/859132
maltatoday, WEDNESDAY, 9 AUGUST 2017 20 Sport SPORTTODAY FOOTBALL Australia embarrassed as FIFA steps in to resolve dispute AUSTRALIAN soccer faces an embarrassing intervention this week as a joint FIFA-Asian Football Confederation delega- tion arrives for talks aimed at ending a bitter power struggle that has plunged the domestic game into crisis. The governing Football Fed- eration Australia (FFA) has been at loggerheads with the country's 10 professional A- League clubs, and come under pressure from FIFA, to expand membership of its 10-member Congress into a more demo- cratic model. The Congress, which elects the FFA board, has representa- tives of the country's nine states and territories but just one delegate for all 10 clubs in the top-flight A-League and none representing the players. The FFA have proposed a 13-member Congress, offer- ing two additional votes to the clubs and one for the players, but this has been rejected by both the clubs and FIFA. The clubs, who say they gen- erate 80 percent of revenues for football in Australia, want at least five seats but the FFA, led by chairman Steven Lowy and CEO David Gallop, have dug their heels in. Lowy has been vocal about his distrust of the clubs' intentions and, like his billionaire father Frank Lowy, who was chair- man before him, has rejected calls to allow an independent commission run the A-League. "Club owners have made no secret of their demands for more power, and more mon- ey. They seek an independent league, run by them for their benefit," he said in a 2,000-word communique addressed to the 'Australian football commu- nity' over the weekend. "But it's worth noting that more than half of the clubs are wholly or majority owned by foreign individuals and or- ganisations with little or no connection to Australian com- munity football or our national teams." Apart from more Congress votes, the clubs have also de- manded more money from the FFA. They have rejected the governing body's offer of A$3.55 million in annual dis- tributions following the record six-year, A$346 million (210.16 million pounds) television deal announced in December. The clubs have demanded up to A$6 million, a figure the FFA has said would damage the grass roots of the game and cut deeply into funding to the na- tional teams. With the dispute rumbling on throughout the year, the FIFA- AFC delegation is set to arrive to hold talks with local stake- holders over the next two days in Sydney in a bid to end the impasse. Without resolution by a Nov. 30 deadline, FIFA will disband the FFA board and install a 'normalisation committee' that would effectively take over gov- ernance of the sport. That it has reached the point where FIFA has intervened is seen as another black eye for the FFA, which was embar- rassed by the Garcia report into the World Cup bidding process for the 2022 tournament won by Qatar. The report found "strong evi- dence" that the FFA had made payments to influence one of FIFA's voting members. Australia's failed bid, which employed over A$50 million in government funding but se- cured only a solitary vote, has long overshadowed the FFA's stewardship of the game. In addition, the ongoing pow- er struggle has revived memo- ries of the strife-torn National Soccer League, which collapsed under a weight of debt in 2004. The idea that FIFA, an organi- sation still buffeted by corrup- tion scandals on a number of fronts, could take over the run- ning of the game is scarcely be- lievable to many in Australian football. "It makes me sick to think (FIFA) are here doing this," Jack Reilly, a former FFA board member, told local broadcaster SBS. "They are a totally disgraced organisation." Steven Lowy and David Gallop of Football Federation of Australia Mourinho ready to crank up interest in Bale if winger not in Madrid plans JOSE Mourinho said on Monday he would step up Manchester United's pursuit of Gareth Bale if the Real Madrid winger was left out of the starting line-up in Tuesday's European Super Cup between the Red Devils and the Champions League holders. Bale was once the world's most expensive player when he joined Madrid from Tottenham Hot- spur for 85.5 million pounds, although his status in Madrid has fallen due to an injury-rav- aged last campaign that saw him miss the starting line-up for the Champions League final win over Juventus. Bale's Real future has been further cast into doubt by the club's reported pursuit of teen- age sensation Kylian Mbappe of Monaco, although he is expected to start against United. Mourinho said he would take the Wales international's ab- sence as an invitation to lure him to Old Trafford. "If he is not in the club's plans, that with the arrival of another player would mean he was on his way out. I will try to be wait- ing for him on the other side and fight with other coaches that would want him on their team," Mourinho told a news confer- ence ahead of Tuesday's game in Skopje. "If he's playing tomorrow, I wouldn't think of that, it would be because he's in the coach's plans and the club's plans, be- cause he also has the motivation to continue at Real Madrid." United have signed striker Romelu Lukaku, midfielder Ne- manja Matic and defender Vic- tor Lindelof this summer for a combined 146 million pounds as they seek to mount a Pre- mier League title challenge after finishing sixth last season, and Mourinho has said he would like one more signing. The Super Cup is the only Eu- ropean trophy Mourinho is yet to win as a coach, having lost the 2003 and 2013 editions while with Porto and Chelsea respec- tively. United have not lifted the trophy since 1991, and the Por- tuguese coach said his side were the underdogs to double Cham- pions League holders Real. "We are going to try but the difference between the Cham- pions League winners and Eu- ropa League winners is obvious. There is a big difference of qual- ity but we believe it's possible," Mourinho said. The coach also raised concerns about the scorching tempera- tures in the Macedonian capital, which have led tournament or- ganisers UEFA to permit water breaks during Tuesday's game. "I knew the weather was like this and since we got back from the United States. In Madrid they have training sessions with the hot weather so must be more adapted than we are but we have to play and enjoy a special mo- ment," he said. "It is not often a player has the chance to play a Super Cup un- less you are like Madrid and Barcelona winning regular Eu- ropean trophies."