How the beautiful game turned ugly
From a notorious drug baron to a grasping Fifa president, it’s now all about the money
In the 1980s and early 1990s, using corruption, intimidation and assassination that he applied to the state and society, druglord Pablo Escobar controlled Colombian football as well as the elite South American continental competition, the Copa Libertadores. Though backed by a brutal criminal network, this was one man. Imagine the power and influence wielded by nation states or multinational corporations in collaboration with the game’s governing body?
This is what has been happening for decades, starting under Fifa president Sepp Blatter during the 2000s, and growing in the years after Gianni Infantino’s ascent in 2016...
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