Uefa and Concacaf demand ‘full review’ of Fifa as pressure builds on Infantino

Gianni Infantino’s leadership of Fifa has been publicly questioned by two of world football’s six continental confederations. On Saturday 1 August 2026, Uefa and Concacaf both issued statements criticising the world governing body and calling for a full review of how it is run. The trigger was Infantino’s announcement that Fifa would no longer proceed with a proposal to sell stakes in its competitions to private investors. Confederations rarely go public like this, and two doing it on the same day is close to unprecedented.

What Uefa and Concacaf actually said

Both bodies pointed to a governance and consultation problem at the top of Fifa. Uefa, which governs European football, welcomed the withdrawal of the stake sale plan and described it as a ‘victory for the whole game’, while criticising the way Fifa’s leadership handled the process. Concacaf, which governs football in North and Central America and the Caribbean, followed on the same day.

The method matters as much as the message. Disagreements between confederations and Fifa are normally settled inside the Council, not through press releases. Going public suggests the internal route had stopped working. And Concacaf is not a peripheral voice right now: it co-hosts the 2026 World Cup alongside the United States, Canada and Mexico.

The private investment plan Fifa dropped

At the centre of the row was a proposal to sell stakes in Fifa’s competitions to private investors. Infantino confirmed the governing body would not proceed with it, and that reversal is what prompted the confederations to speak.

The commercial logic is familiar across football: cash now in exchange for a slice of future revenue. It becomes contentious when the asset is not a company but a competition that, in the confederations’ view, belongs to the game collectively. That is precisely the point Uefa was making by framing the outcome as a win for the whole game rather than for Europe alone.

How it reads from England and the Premier League

English football has already had this argument. In 2021 the Premier League held talks with private equity groups about selling a stake in its overseas broadcasting rights before clubs walked away from the idea, choosing to keep full ownership of the league’s commercial future. The English Football League took the opposite path in 2025 when it agreed a long-term funding deal with Apollo Global Management.

That split is a useful frame for the Fifa row. The question was never whether outside capital works, but who is entitled to trade away revenue that future boards, clubs and federations will depend on. Premier League clubs concluded that a stake sale locked in terms for decades on the basis of one commercial cycle’s valuation.

The Football Association, as a Uefa member, is aligned by default with Nyon’s position. Saturday’s statements came from the confederations rather than from individual national associations, and no English intervention accompanied them.

Infantino’s decade in charge

Gianni Infantino has been president of Fifa since February 2016, elected after Sepp Blatter’s departure. He was previously Uefa’s general secretary, which gives the current standoff an extra edge: the sharpest criticism is coming from the organisation where he built his career.

His tenure has delivered the expansion of the World Cup to 48 teams, an enlarged Club World Cup and a far more aggressive commercial strategy. Fifa’s revenues have grown substantially as a result, but so has pressure on the international calendar, a recurring flashpoint with European leagues and player unions.

What happens next

Calling for a full review is not the same as getting one. Any audit of Fifa’s governance would need to go through its own bodies, the Council or the Congress, where every member association holds a single vote. That is the ceiling on European pressure: Uefa carries enormous financial weight and far less arithmetical weight.

Three things to watch over the coming weeks. Whether the four remaining confederations break their silence. Whether the issue reaches the agenda of the next Fifa Council meeting. And how the institutional atmosphere affects preparations for the 2026 World Cup, given that Concacaf is both a co-host and now an open critic of the governing body.

FAQ