A bitter rift at the top of global football has escalated dramatically, with European football’s governing body Uefa moving forward with planned criminal legal proceedings against Fifa president Gianni Infantino centered on a now-abandoned scheme to sell private stakes in the World Cup and other top Fifa competitions.
Internal documents obtained by BBC Sport senior journalist Daniel Austin confirm Uefa has filed applications to access critical evidence and documents that will underpin its upcoming criminal case against Infantino in Switzerland, where the global governing body Fifa is headquartered. The European association accuses the Fifa president of criminal mismanagement over the controversial proposal.
The plan at the center of the dispute was first tabled by Infantino shortly after this summer’s men’s World Cup. Under the proposal, a new subsidiary called Fifa Forward Enterprise (FFE) would be created to hold the commercial rights to the men’s World Cup, women’s World Cup and Club World Cup, with minority stakes then sold off to private external investors. The scheme was quickly scrapped after triggering widespread condemnation and backlash from confederations and member associations across global football.
In its evidence application, Uefa lays out explosive allegations that Infantino designed the scheme specifically to benefit himself and a small inner circle of associates, at the direct expense of Fifa, its 211 member associations, and the broader global football community. “In truth, it was a vehicle for Infantino and that small circle to acquire a permanent stake in and otherwise profit from Fifa’s most valuable assets to the detriment of Fifa, its members, and other parties within the football family,” the document reads.
Uefa further claims that Infantino rushed the plan through internal Fifa approval in a last-minute, hastily called meeting. Only a limited group of Fifa management staff were invited, with some learning of the multi-billion-dollar proposal for the first time at the meeting and given just hours to sign off on the unprecedented scheme, the application alleges.
The European body also argues that the valuation of the stakes on offer was never verified by an independent third party, and that the $4.2bn asking price for a permanent stake in Fifa’s commercial operations implied an unreasonably low total enterprise value of just $20bn. Uefa calls the pricing “a fraudulently off-market price promoted by Infantino for his own benefit”, noting that the valuation was not set through an open, competitive bidding process or vetted by independent valuation experts.
To build its case, Uefa has filed an evidence access request with a Florida court, seeking to obtain records held by two Fifa-affiliated entities based in the U.S. state: Fifa Americas and FWC2026. These documents would then be used to support the criminal proceedings planned for Switzerland.
Uefa says the scrapped investment scheme posed direct potential harm to its 55 member nations, and notes that criminal proceedings could also be brought against other senior Fifa officials and advisors involved in developing the plan, beyond just Infantino. “Uefa and other interested parties are preparing to bring criminal claims in Switzerland against Infantino and possibly other Fifa officials and advisors for criminal mismanagement,” the application confirms.
The document adds that the plan’s secretive development, flawed valuation and opaque structure caused concrete damage to Fifa’s global reputation, governance credibility and key commercial relationships, harming both the governing body itself and all 211 of its member associations.
Contrary to Infantino’s claims that the plan was a transparent new proposal, Uefa alleges the scheme was developed in secret for more than a year by Infantino and a small group of co-conspirators, without any consultation with the Fifa Council, other continental confederations, or any of Fifa’s member associations. The public announcement of the plan on 28 July 2026 marked the first time any outside stakeholders learned of the initiative, the application says.
Uefa also references the well-documented history of corruption among senior Fifa leadership, arguing that the body’s concentrated power has long operated without effective internal checks and balances, with meaningful accountability only coming from external pressures such as public scrutiny, political pressure and international criminal law enforcement.
Under Swiss law, where Fifa is headquartered in Zurich, Uefa confirmed it has legal standing as a complainant to file the criminal mismanagement complaint, and that Swiss legal counsel has confirmed the proceeding is valid under local statute.
To win support for his proposal, Infantino reportedly offered each of Fifa’s 211 member associations a $40m payout if they backed the FFE private investment scheme. After widespread backlash led by Uefa, which pulled its support and secured a vote from its members to boycott future World Cups unless the plan was scrapped, Infantino walked back the proposal earlier this month. The move did not end the pressure, however, and he has faced growing calls to step down entirely.
Infantino, who is currently running for a fourth term as Fifa president in the upcoming March election, has already been accused of breaking trust through deception in a joint open letter from Uefa, Concacaf (North America’s governing body) and the Asian Football Confederation. All four UK home nations have withdrawn their support for his re-election bid, while he retains backing from South America’s Conmebol and Africa’s Caf. A number of individual member associations have broken ranks with their own confederations to publicly support the incumbent president.
In recent days, Uefa president Aleksander Ceferin, whose relationship with Infantino has deteriorated sharply in recent months, ruled out running for the Fifa presidency himself, while a coalition of top current and former players has publicly united to call for leadership change at the top of global football, stating that “change is necessary” at Fifa.
BBC Sport has reached out to both Infantino, Fifa and Uefa for comment on the new criminal proceedings, and as of publication has not received responses.
