FIFA is facing fresh allegations of corruption over its controversial decision to award the 2022 World Cup to Qatar. The Sunday Times claims to have 'obtained' millions of secret documents - e-mails, letters and bank transfers - which, it alleges, are 'proof' that the disgraced Qatari football official Mohamed Bin Hammam made payments totalling over three million quid to football officials in return for their support for the Qatar bid. Qatar 2022 and Bin Hammam have always strenuously denied the former FIFA vice-president actively lobbied on their behalf in the run-up to the vote in December 2010. But, according to e-mails 'obtained' by The Sunday Times, it is 'now clear' that Bin Hammam, was lobbying on his country's behalf at least a year before the decision was made. The documents also appear to show how Bin Hammam was making payments directly to football officials in Africa to, allegedly, buy their support for Qatar in the contest. When approached by The Sunday Times to respond to their claims, Bin Hammam's son Hamad Al Abdulla declined to comment on his behalf. 
Although the vast majority of the officials did not have a vote, The Sunday Times alleges that Bin Hammam's strategy was to win a groundswell of support for the Qatari bid which would then influence the four African FIFA executive committee members who were able to take part in the election. The Sunday Times also alleges that it has documents which prove Bin Hammam paid three hundred and five thousand Euros to cover the legal expenses of another former FIFA executive committee member from Oceania, Reynald Temarii. Temarii, from Tahiti, was unable to vote in the contest as he had already been suspended by FIFA after he was caught out by a previous Sunday Times sting asking bogus American bid officials for money in return for his support. The paper now alleges that Bin Hammam provided Temaril with 'financial assistance' to allow him to appeal against the FIFA suspension, delaying his removal from the executive committee and blocking his deputy, David Chung, from voting in the 2022 election. The paper claims that had Chung been allowed to vote he would have supported Qatar's rivals Australia. Instead there was no representative from Oceania allowed to vote, a decision which may have influenced the outcome in Qatar's favour. 
Bin Hammam was initially banned from football for life in July 2011 after being found guilty of attempted bribery. The allegations centred around bids to buy votes in the FIFA presidential election of that year. However his ban was annulled a year later by the Court of Arbitration for Sport which said there was 'insufficient evidence' to support the punishment. Bin Hammam then quit football saying that he had seen 'the very ugly face of football.' FIFA issued him with a second life ban in December 2012 for 'conflicts of interest' while he was president of the Asian Football Confederation. In March 2014, the Daily Torygraph reported that a company owned by Bin Hammam had paid former FIFA vice-president Jack Warner and his family more than one million smackers. Payments were claimed to have been made shortly after Qatar won the right to host the 2022 World Cup. The paper also makes fresh allegations about the relationship between Bin Hammam and Warner. Although Warner was forced to resign as a FIFA vice-president in 2011, after it was proved he had helped Bin Hammam to bribe Caribbean football officials in return for their support in his bid to oust the long-standing FIFA president Sepp Blatter, the paper says it 'has evidence' which shows more than $1.6m was paid by Bin Hammam to Warner, including four hundred and fifty thousand dollars in the period immediately before the vote. The new allegations will place FIFA under fresh pressure to re-run the vote for the 2022 World Cup, which was held in conjunction with the vote for the 2018 tournament. FIFA's chief investigator Michael Garcia is already conducting a long-running inquiry into allegations of corruption and wrongdoing during the 2018 and 2022 decisions. He is due to meet senior officials from the Qatar 2022 organising committee in Oman on Monday. But that meeting may now have to be postponed in light of The Sunday Times revelations.
Anyway, here's a couple of Top Telly Tips for your diaries:
Thursday 12 June
The World Cup starts and the opening match Brazil versus Croatia (kick-off 9.00pm) will be covered - incompetently as always - by ITV along with the opening ceremony. The twentieth staging of the competition gets under way at the Arena de Sao Paulo, where the host nation begin their Group A campaign. This is the second time that Brazil has hosted the tournament, with the last occasion in 1950 finishing with them as runners-up to their big rivals Uruguay.
The feast of global football has remarkably not been held on South American soil since Argentina's controversial home victory (for which read as bent as a David Beckham free-kick) of 1978. Brazil are always expected to be involved in the latter stages and have the honour of being the only nation to play in every World Cup finals, but the pressure on The Samba Boys is higher than ever this year, with nothing less than victory being acceptable to their adoring, yet hard-to-please, fans. Several Premier League-based players are expected to be involved, with the starting XI for the hosts looking to add their names to an illustrious list of World Cup heroes that includes the likes of Pele, Garrincha, Jairzinho, Rivalino, Socrates, Zico and Ronaldo. They begin against a Croatian side which needed a play-off against Iceland to qualify for the finals after finishing behind Belgium in their group and, while they possess a talented squad of players, they will not be expected to spoil the party this evening despite opening matches being notoriously difficult to predict. Plus, live coverage of the opening ceremony with Matt Smith and guests. Presented by odious grump greed bucket, horrorshow (and drag) Adrian Chiles, with - rubbish - commentary by Clive Tyldesley and Andy Townsend, and - equally rubbish - analysis by Fabio Cannavaro, Lee Dixon and Patrick Vieira.
Friday 13 June
The BBC's coverage of the World Cup gets under way with Spain versus The Netherlands (kick-off 8.00pm). The opening Group B match for both teams, which takes place at the Arena Fonte Nova in Salvador, is a repeat of the 2010 final (one of the worst games in the history of football, as it happens). The Spaniards in the Works enter the tournament as the reigning champions after beating the Dutchies in the last World Cup final in South Africa. What was expected to be a showpiece contest turned into an ill-tempered and depressingly poor affair which produced more yellow cards - fourteen - than shots on goal and saw Johnny Heitinga extremely sent off following a second booking in extra time, shortly before Spain produced a winner through Andres Iniesta.
This evening's fixture could prove to be another cagey encounter, especially as both nations will be eager to start the campaign with a positive result (or, at least, not a negative), as they attempt to navigate their passage to the knock-out stage from a group which also includes Australia and Chile. While the Spanish side will be among the favourites for glory once again after winning their last three major tournaments and reaching the final of the Confederations Cup in Brazil last year, the Dutch will fancy their chances after going undefeated through the qualifying campaign, winning nine of their ten fixtures. Presented by yer actual Gary Lineker, with commentary by Steve Wilson and monosyllabic Mark Lawrenson, and analysis by the barely coherent Rio Ferdinand, full-of-himself French-type person Thierry Henry and Alan Shearer. Who will, hopefully, give La Grande Thierry an elbow in the mush if he starts any of his stuck-up 'why isn't everybody talking about me, me, me, me, me, me, me' malarkey.
Although the vast majority of the officials did not have a vote, The Sunday Times alleges that Bin Hammam's strategy was to win a groundswell of support for the Qatari bid which would then influence the four African FIFA executive committee members who were able to take part in the election. The Sunday Times also alleges that it has documents which prove Bin Hammam paid three hundred and five thousand Euros to cover the legal expenses of another former FIFA executive committee member from Oceania, Reynald Temarii. Temarii, from Tahiti, was unable to vote in the contest as he had already been suspended by FIFA after he was caught out by a previous Sunday Times sting asking bogus American bid officials for money in return for his support. The paper now alleges that Bin Hammam provided Temaril with 'financial assistance' to allow him to appeal against the FIFA suspension, delaying his removal from the executive committee and blocking his deputy, David Chung, from voting in the 2022 election. The paper claims that had Chung been allowed to vote he would have supported Qatar's rivals Australia. Instead there was no representative from Oceania allowed to vote, a decision which may have influenced the outcome in Qatar's favour. 
Bin Hammam was initially banned from football for life in July 2011 after being found guilty of attempted bribery. The allegations centred around bids to buy votes in the FIFA presidential election of that year. However his ban was annulled a year later by the Court of Arbitration for Sport which said there was 'insufficient evidence' to support the punishment. Bin Hammam then quit football saying that he had seen 'the very ugly face of football.' FIFA issued him with a second life ban in December 2012 for 'conflicts of interest' while he was president of the Asian Football Confederation. In March 2014, the Daily Torygraph reported that a company owned by Bin Hammam had paid former FIFA vice-president Jack Warner and his family more than one million smackers. Payments were claimed to have been made shortly after Qatar won the right to host the 2022 World Cup. The paper also makes fresh allegations about the relationship between Bin Hammam and Warner. Although Warner was forced to resign as a FIFA vice-president in 2011, after it was proved he had helped Bin Hammam to bribe Caribbean football officials in return for their support in his bid to oust the long-standing FIFA president Sepp Blatter, the paper says it 'has evidence' which shows more than $1.6m was paid by Bin Hammam to Warner, including four hundred and fifty thousand dollars in the period immediately before the vote. The new allegations will place FIFA under fresh pressure to re-run the vote for the 2022 World Cup, which was held in conjunction with the vote for the 2018 tournament. FIFA's chief investigator Michael Garcia is already conducting a long-running inquiry into allegations of corruption and wrongdoing during the 2018 and 2022 decisions. He is due to meet senior officials from the Qatar 2022 organising committee in Oman on Monday. But that meeting may now have to be postponed in light of The Sunday Times revelations.Anyway, here's a couple of Top Telly Tips for your diaries:
Thursday 12 June
The World Cup starts and the opening match Brazil versus Croatia (kick-off 9.00pm) will be covered - incompetently as always - by ITV along with the opening ceremony. The twentieth staging of the competition gets under way at the Arena de Sao Paulo, where the host nation begin their Group A campaign. This is the second time that Brazil has hosted the tournament, with the last occasion in 1950 finishing with them as runners-up to their big rivals Uruguay.
The feast of global football has remarkably not been held on South American soil since Argentina's controversial home victory (for which read as bent as a David Beckham free-kick) of 1978. Brazil are always expected to be involved in the latter stages and have the honour of being the only nation to play in every World Cup finals, but the pressure on The Samba Boys is higher than ever this year, with nothing less than victory being acceptable to their adoring, yet hard-to-please, fans. Several Premier League-based players are expected to be involved, with the starting XI for the hosts looking to add their names to an illustrious list of World Cup heroes that includes the likes of Pele, Garrincha, Jairzinho, Rivalino, Socrates, Zico and Ronaldo. They begin against a Croatian side which needed a play-off against Iceland to qualify for the finals after finishing behind Belgium in their group and, while they possess a talented squad of players, they will not be expected to spoil the party this evening despite opening matches being notoriously difficult to predict. Plus, live coverage of the opening ceremony with Matt Smith and guests. Presented by odious grump greed bucket, horrorshow (and drag) Adrian Chiles, with - rubbish - commentary by Clive Tyldesley and Andy Townsend, and - equally rubbish - analysis by Fabio Cannavaro, Lee Dixon and Patrick Vieira. Friday 13 June
The BBC's coverage of the World Cup gets under way with Spain versus The Netherlands (kick-off 8.00pm). The opening Group B match for both teams, which takes place at the Arena Fonte Nova in Salvador, is a repeat of the 2010 final (one of the worst games in the history of football, as it happens). The Spaniards in the Works enter the tournament as the reigning champions after beating the Dutchies in the last World Cup final in South Africa. What was expected to be a showpiece contest turned into an ill-tempered and depressingly poor affair which produced more yellow cards - fourteen - than shots on goal and saw Johnny Heitinga extremely sent off following a second booking in extra time, shortly before Spain produced a winner through Andres Iniesta.
This evening's fixture could prove to be another cagey encounter, especially as both nations will be eager to start the campaign with a positive result (or, at least, not a negative), as they attempt to navigate their passage to the knock-out stage from a group which also includes Australia and Chile. While the Spanish side will be among the favourites for glory once again after winning their last three major tournaments and reaching the final of the Confederations Cup in Brazil last year, the Dutch will fancy their chances after going undefeated through the qualifying campaign, winning nine of their ten fixtures. Presented by yer actual Gary Lineker, with commentary by Steve Wilson and monosyllabic Mark Lawrenson, and analysis by the barely coherent Rio Ferdinand, full-of-himself French-type person Thierry Henry and Alan Shearer. Who will, hopefully, give La Grande Thierry an elbow in the mush if he starts any of his stuck-up 'why isn't everybody talking about me, me, me, me, me, me, me' malarkey. 
