Sepp Blatter once described 'fixed draw' with genius way of telling balls apart
Sepp Blatter, who stepped down as FIFA president in 2015 amid allegations he had sanctioned an illegal payment of Michel Platini, insists he never rigged a draw
Disgraced former FIFA president Sepp Blatter once described how a draw could be fixed – but insisted he never resorted to such foul play.
Blatter, now 87, stepped down from his role as FIFA president in 2015 amid allegations he had sanctioned an illegal payment of £1.6million to the then UEFA president Michel Platini. FIFA initially banned Blatter for eight years, reduced to six, but in March 2021 he was handed a new ban for “various violations” of the governing body’s code of ethics, suspending him from football until 2028.
In 2016, after his ban, he revealed in an interview with an Argentine publication that he had witnessed draws being fixed at “European level”, under UEFA's jurisdiction rather than FIFA's.
“Of course it’s possible that they can be signalled, by heating or cooling them,” said Blatter. “It doesn’t happen in FIFA, but I’ve witnessed draws at European level where it has happened, but never in FIFA. Of course it can be done, but it never happened under my watch, never.”
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Blatter even expanded on how a ‘blind’ draw could be fixed, saying: “Balls are put in the freezer before the draw, at the slightest touch you can tell if the balls are hot or cold. By touching them you know exactly what you have.”
Blatter did not divulge which competition he believed had been rigged or which teams had been affected. Since leaving world football administration in disgrace, the Swiss has made a number of revelations, including admitting that last year’s World Cup should never have been awarded to Qatar.
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Blatter was at the FIFA helm in 2010 when the tournament was controversially awarded to the Middle East country. He told Swiss newspaper Tages-Anzeiger: “The choice of Qatar was a mistake. At the time, we actually agreed in the (FIFA) Executive Committee that Russia should get the 2018 World Cup and the USA that of 2022.
“It would have been a gesture of peace if the two long-standing political opponents had hosted the World Cup one after the other.”
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Blatter said he had voted for the United States and that former UEFA president Michel Platini had helped turn the vote in Qatar’s favour.
“Thanks to the four votes of Platini and his (UEFA) team, the World Cup went to Qatar rather than the United States. It’s the truth.”
When asked why he was opposed to Qatar hosting the finals, Blatter said: “It’s too small a country. Football and the World Cup are too big for that.”