Scandal-plagued FIFA have turned to the man who helped the International Olympic Committee (IOC) out of their corruption crisis, appointing Swiss Francois Carrard as chairman of their reform committee.
Two top sponsors of FIFA and its World Cup tournaments on Friday ratcheted up pressure on the global football body for major reforms as a corruption scandal casts a lengthening shadow over the sport.
Campaigners call for Kofi Annan to take charge of FIFA reform.
FIFA approved major reforms at a congress on Friday, part of world football's effort to end the culture of corruption that has plagued its governing body for years. The measures were adopted by 179 members, while 22 voted against and six abstained at a congress in Zurich that will also elect a replacement to FIFA's disgraced president Sepp Blatter. The reforms were developed since June by a committee led by Francois Carrard, a Swiss lawyer tasked with a similar cleanup effort at the International Olympic Committee more than a decade ago. Among the most crucial measures are changes in the role of FIFA's president and its executive committee. The president's job has been altered to function like a corporate chairman of the board, providing strategic guidance but with less management authority. FIFA's executive committee, which had become an epicenter of graft, has been re-branded as a FIFA council, and will operate similar to a corporate board of directions. FIFA's secretary general, previously number two to the president, will serve as world football's CEO.
FIFA faces potentially the greatest challenge to its authority since it was formed 111 years ago following the launch on Wednesday of the 'New FIFA Now' coalition of reformists calling for change.
The general secretary of the world players' union FIFPro has blasted FIFA.
A Las Vegas museum devoted to the exploits of Tommy gun-wielding mobsters will open a permanent display that explores the "rampant corruption" of global soccer's scandal-rocked governing body, which has drawn comparisons to organized crime.
FIFA presidential candidate Jerome Champagne has protested to football's world governing body about the number of observers allowed into the hall for Friday's election, saying he believed they were working for his rivals.
The leadership of crisis-hit world football governing body FIFA gathered at their Zurich headquarters on Monday to set a date for the vote to replace outgoing president Sepp Blatter.
In an indictment released by the Department of Justice on Wednesday, Hawilla was one of four convicted defendants who helped US investigators build their case against 14 top global soccer officials and sports marketing executives accused of orchestrating more than $150 million in bribes and kickbacks.
News of all that's transpired on and off the football field.
Sepp Blatter faces months of troubles before departure.
Cameroon's Issa Hayatou will take over as interim FIFA president following the provisional suspension of Sepp Blatter in a corruption scandal.
"We ran a clean bid. I know that others did not, and I have shared what I know with the authorities," the Football Federation Australia (FFA) chairman wrote.
News of all that's transpired on and off the football field
Russia is ready to carry out an investigation into doping allegations against its athletes in concert with independent organisations, Interfax news agency quoted Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko as saying on Friday.
Lamine Diack, the former president of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), was responsible for organizing and enabling the conspiracy and corruption that took place in athletics' governing body, an independent commission of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) said on Thursday.
India 'throws up' investment opportunities for Qatar investors.
Nike Inc and some other big international companies face a grilling over their powerful role in Brazilian soccer.
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Monday.
Sebastian Coe has long been one of the most outspoken critics of doping in athletics yet the newly-elected president of the sport's governing body has remained silent this week in the face of potentially its most damning drugs scandal yet.
