Montagliani to seek Concacaf re-election and rule out FIFA challenge
Victor Montagliani will stand for re-election as Concacaf president next year, ruling himself out of a challenge to Gianni Infantino for the FIFA presidency.
The Canadian told Concacaf staff at a town hall meeting late last month that he wants to keep serving the region's members. He has since passed that message to most of Concacaf's 41 national associations, The Guardian reported.
Concacaf, the confederation that runs football in North and Central America and the Caribbean, will choose its president in the first quarter of next year. That vote is expected in February.
The decision settles one big question before the FIFA presidential election. That vote will take place on 18 March in Rabat, for the 2027-2031 cycle. Infantino said in April he will seek a fourth term.
Montagliani had been described as the most credible potential challenger to Infantino. He is a FIFA vice-president and was unanimously re-elected as Concacaf president in 2023, with his current term due to end in 2027.
Europe will also have continuity at the top. Aleksander Ceferin confirmed to UEFA's 55 member associations at a meeting in Berlin that he will stand again as UEFA president. UEFA is European football's governing body. Ceferin will stand for a fourth term.
The politics do not stop there. The FIFA Council, FIFA's main decision-making body, meets in Zurich next Thursday. Montagliani, Ceferin and Asian Football Confederation president Salman bin Ibrahim al-Khalifa are expected to use it to demand an independent review of the FIFA Forward Enterprise plan.
The three men wrote to Infantino last month calling for FIFA to share a portion of its $6bn cash reserves with members. Montagliani has pushed for at least $10 million to go to each of FIFA's 211 member associations, Reuters reported. Salman, a former FIFA election opponent of Infantino, has joined Ceferin and Montagliani in calling for Infantino to step down.
For fans, this means the power fight shifts from the ballot box to the boardroom. No star challenger will face Infantino in Rabat. The argument instead will be about money, scrutiny and who controls the game's vast reserves.
