GENEVA — In an unprecedented move that has sent shockwaves through global soccer governance, all 55 member national associations of the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) voted unanimously Thursday to withdraw from all FIFA competitions indefinitely, in open revolt against FIFA President Gianni Infantino’s controversial plan to sell a 20% stake in World Cup commercial operations to private equity investors.
The boycott announcement, delivered following an emergency virtual strategy meeting of European soccer leaders, puts immediate upcoming FIFA tournaments at risk. The FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup, scheduled to kick off in just weeks on September 5 in Poland, is now under serious threat of cancellation. Additionally, the only active bid for the 2035 Women’s World Cup comes from a consortium of four British national federations, leaving FIFA with no alternative candidates as it prepares to award hosting rights on November 23.
In a sharply worded statement released after the meeting, UEFA drew a clear line in the sand over the sanctity of global soccer’s marquee event. “Some things are simply too important to sell,” the statement read. “The FIFA World Cup belongs to football. It always will. And so long as Europe has a voice, it will never be for sale.”
Infantino’s surprise plan, first exposed this week, would spin off FIFA’s entire commercial division into a new $20 billion subsidiary, FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE), offering a 20% ownership share to outside private investors. The lead investor lined up for the deal is a New York-based investment firm founded by Joshua Kushner, brother of Jared Kushner, former U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law.
To push the plan through for a vote by FIFA’s 211 global member associations, Infantino has offered a one-time $20 million payout to every member that approves the proposal by mid-September, double the $10 million in base development funding members were already promised for the next four years. He projects that by 2038, each member would receive $86 million in total FIFA funding under the new model, up from the current projected $36 million. But UEFA argues the plan represents a fundamental betrayal of FIFA’s non-profit mission as the global custodian of soccer. “This is not merely a profound failure of leadership, but an abdication of FIFA’s duty as the custodian of world football,” UEFA said, noting Infantino spent decades as a senior UEFA administrator before being elected FIFA president in 2016.
The high-stakes financial gambit has now put Infantino’s 11-year hold on the FIFA presidency in serious jeopardy, just months before a scheduled presidential election. Just 11 days ago, after the men’s Club World Cup final in New Jersey, Infantino appeared poised to win a fourth and final term unopposed through 2031, even amid controversy over his decision to allow U.S. forward Folarin Balogun to play against Belgium despite carrying a red card suspension from a previous match. Now, open opposition has emerged from three of FIFA’s six continental confederations, and candidate filing deadline for the election, set for November 18, is looming. Soccer insiders have also privately noted Infantino has been positioning himself for a highly paid executive leadership role at FFE after his presidential term ends in 2031.
Fan groups have already thrown their support behind the boycott, with Football Supporters Europe, an organization that advises UEFA on fan-related issues, posting “Game over, Gianni #InfantinOUT” on social media following Thursday’s announcement.
UEFA outlined clear, long-standing concerns about the risks of bringing outside private investment into the core of global soccer governance. “The moment external investors acquire ownership interests in FIFA competitions, football changes forever,” the group’s statement explained. “Commercial return becomes a permanent obligation. Investor expectations become a daily pressure.” While Infantino has framed the proposal as a way to “turbocharge” development funding for soccer in emerging nations, where most of FIFA’s 211 members rely on FIFA grants to operate, European officials counter that FIFA already holds multi-billion-dollar reserves that could be used to expand development programs without ceding control to private investors.
The boycott will remain in place until the FFE plan is scrapped entirely, UEFA confirmed. “As a result of today’s discussion, no UEFA national teams will participate in any FIFA competition for so long as these proposals remain alive, unless this proposal has been abandoned in its entirety and binding assurances have been given that FIFA will never again open its governance or competitions to private ownership.”
In a rare break from his past alliance with Infantino, Asian Football Confederation (AFC) president Sheikh Salman bin Ibrahim Al Khalifa, who lost the 2016 FIFA presidential election to Infantino, also joined the criticism Thursday in a letter to AFC’s 46 member associations. “FIFA’s unilateral actions appear to undermine the very foundations of continental football,” Sheikh Salman wrote, warning that the plan poses direct risks to the autonomy of regional and national competitions. “Such an initiative will not succeed without the support of all the confederations, which is not the case now.”
In a pre-recorded video message released Wednesday, Infantino attempted to downplay the opposition, framing the FFE plan as “an offer, not an obligation” for member associations. Internal FIFA presentation materials, co-written with banking advisor J.P. Morgan and reviewed by the Associated Press, state FFE’s goal is to bring “commercial rigor and expertise to better capitalize on broadcast rights, sponsorships and a growing tournament portfolio.”
Critics warn the plan would allow FIFA to expand its event portfolio, potentially adding more teams to men’s and women’s World Cups and Club World Cups, and even staging the tournaments more frequently than the current four-year cycle, most likely in the United States. This expanded FIFA calendar would further crowd an already overloaded global soccer schedule, eroding the value, profile and scheduling space of continental competitions run by bodies like UEFA and AFC, including World Cup qualifiers, continental championships, and continental club competitions such as the UEFA Champions League. Sheikh Salman emphasized the need for Asian soccer leaders to understand the full impact of the plan on the long-term sustainability of regional and domestic competitions.
This is not the first time European soccer bodies have used a World Cup boycott threat to block one of Infantino’s major structural changes. In 2021, a similar European boycott derailed Infantino’s proposal to switch the men’s World Cup from a four-year cycle to every two years.