England Joins Wales in Withdrawing Support for Infantino's FIFA Re-Election
The English FA has confirmed it will write to FIFA withdrawing its backing of Gianni Infantino's re-election bid, days after his $20 billion World Cup sell-off plan collapsed under pressure from UEFA and member associations. Wales got there first — and more nations are expected to follow.
The FA's move
The English FA is set to write to FIFA withdrawing a previous letter of support for Gianni Infantino's re-election as FIFA president for the 2027–2031 term, Sky Sports reported on Monday morning. Over the weekend, the FA had already called for a "robust review" of FIFA's leadership over the abandoned investment plan; it has now gone further, confirming to LBC it would formally retract its backing. In a statement, the FA said: "We fully support UEFA's position. It is time for a full and robust review of FIFA's leadership and governance to ensure that the global game is run transparently, for the benefit of all 211 member nations and with the long-term stewardship of football at its heart." The reversal is a striking one: FA chair Debbie Hewitt, who also sits as a FIFA vice-president, was pictured handing Infantino an England shirt with his name on the back before England's World Cup semi-final defeat to Argentina in Atlanta in July.
Wales got there first
The Football Association of Wales (FAW) became the first national association to formally withdraw its support, writing to FIFA to confirm "its withdrawal of support for the candidature of Mr Gianni Infantino, for re-election as FIFA President for the 2027-2031 term." A FAW spokesperson said: "The recent failures in good governance, processes, leadership, values, stakeholder management, communications and sound judgement have led us to a position where Mr Infantino has lost the confidence of the FAW to remain at the helm of world football. Failing to put the best interests of football first is a failure we cannot accept." The move is notable given Wales hosted Infantino for meetings only months ago, and is expected to trigger other federations to follow suit.
Germany piles on — and it's not just UEFA
Germany's FA president, Bernd Neuendorf, added his voice to the pressure campaign, saying: "The events surrounding this project initiated by Gianni Infantino must now be fully investigated. The FIFA president acted unilaterally, opaquely and ultimately irresponsibly." His comments echo a joint statement issued Saturday by UEFA and, notably, CONCACAF — the confederation covering North and Central America — both of whom said they had lost confidence in Infantino's leadership, a position the English FA explicitly endorsed. UEFA has gone further still, sending FIFA a document preservation order that blocks the destruction of emails, files or data connected to the scrapped plan, amid unconfirmed media reports it is weighing legal action.
How we got here
The crisis traces back to Infantino's plan to bundle the World Cup and Club World Cup's commercial rights into a new subsidiary valued at roughly $20 billion, selling a 20% stake to outside investors. UEFA's 55 members voted unanimously to boycott FIFA competitions, including the World Cup, if the plan went ahead, while CONCACAF and the Asian Football Confederation also rejected it. Facing near-universal opposition, Infantino scrapped the proposal in the early hours of Saturday, saying it had "created divisions of a nature that, regardless of the level of support, are no longer in the interest of the objective set out in the first place." UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham called the U-turn "the right decision."
What's next
Scrapping the plan hasn't drawn a line under the affair. Sky Sports reports that "many more letters and announcements are likely in the next few hours and days," describing a coordinated push by European federations to force Infantino out as quickly as possible. So far, though, Infantino has shown no sign of being ready to resign — instead trying to shore up his position by courting the federations who still back him, mostly in Africa, Asia and South America. Pressure is nonetheless building ahead of FIFA's presidential election, due to be held in March 2027 in Rabat, Morocco. Infantino, in power for a decade, is entitled to seek one further term and had commanded support from more than 200 associations before this episode — but with Wales, England and Germany all turning on him within days, he is now considered almost certain to face at least one rival challenger at the election, even if he survives in the short term.
Sources: Sky Sports, Reuters (via Al Jazeera), LBC, RTE, Yahoo Sports, Goal.com, August 3, 2026.