Perhaps it was fitting that Aleksander Ceferin chose Paris for a hall of mirrors show, just a dozen miles from the real thing in Versailles, but the consequences of last Thursday’s events may be far from illusory. The Uefa president’s dramatic announcement that he did not, after all, plan to run for an unprecedented fourth term was timed in part to wrongfoot his doubters but served only to amplify questions about the governing body’s future.
Had Ceferin not decided to press for an alteration to Uefa’s term limits there would have been little discussion at this point around the election of a new leader in 2027. It had been a given that this was his time to step down. Perhaps the Slovenian, emerging from a succession of controversies, might have been able to build on the more constructive elements of his reign and depart on a relative high.
Instead, he allowed the waters to be muddied at what many, inside and outside the organisation, agree is the worst possible time. Ceferin pronounced himself “tired of Covid, two wars, and the nonsense projects of the so-called Super League”, repeating sentiments aired three weeks previously, but at least two of those problems have not gone away and he still has three-quarters of a four-year term to serve. The last of them still risks posing an existential threat to the sport if given enough oxygen and European football can ill afford to carry a leader who feels out of fight.
His words will certainly have resonated at A22, the company driving the Super League project. Since late last year A22 has been networking extensively around Europe’s small and medium sized clubs, a pool that increasingly appears to be a vital battlefield in the tussle for football’s future, but it has been at least as active in the corridors of Brussels. Ceferin’s claim that he sat on his decision not to stand for six months in order to “see the real face of some people” will not have been lost on European Commission operatives, not to mention those lobbying them to take a firm line on holes in Uefa’s governance.
Whether or not one believes Ceferin, and there are those in his orbit who have their doubts, he may come to regret airing such clumsy logic in public. There is always the risk, too, that insiders feel their loyalties taken for granted. After seeing his revisions voted through overwhelmingly he suggested media outlets, including the Guardian, should be “a bit embarrassed” at reporting divides within Uefa. But since last week’s congress it has emerged that there was widespread surprise among executive committee members, even some of those particularly loyal to Ceferin, at news of his plans to depart. There was no synchronised briefing. Some federations are also understood to have been disappointed, to say the least, that they were not advised in advance. None of this is conducive to a climate of trust and cooperation.
If Ceferin had sought to smoke out dissenters then the Football Association, a lone voice against his statute changes, willingly showed its hand. The FA was at pains to emphasise that its vote, which backed the stance of their vice-president and the Uefa treasurer, David Gill, was about principles and not personalities. Nonetheless, it felt significant that this was the first time since 2011, when the then-chairman, David Bernstein, called for Sepp Blatter’s re-election as Fifa president to be halted in an effort to reform the listing global body, that it has swum so publicly against the tide.
Suggestions that the FA may take heat from Uefa’s leadership for its stance are tempered by the fact there are few available punches to throw. Wembley will stage this season’s Champions League final, and the UK and Republic of Ireland will host Euro 2028; both will require maximum cooperation, particularly given the litany of security failings at recent events. The FA will certainly require backing from Uefa, though, if it seeks to bid for the 2031 Women’s World Cup this year.
Fealty within Uefa may be tested further as candidates for the presidency begin jostling for position. There is a sense Ceferin has fired the starting gun ahead of time and that this presents another distraction from more pressing concerns. Obvious candidates are few: the Portugal FA president, Fernando Gomes, is respected across the board but he will be 75 when the election comes around and may be best viewed as an emergency option if football’s storm clouds are raging. The Romanian Razvan Burleanu, a Fifa council member, is viewed in influential circles as a more youthful, urbane option but there is no indication he will mount a challenge. The former player Levan Kobiashvili, who heads up Georgia’s federation and was voted on to the Uefa executive committee last year, is a close ally of Ceferin and could become an outside bet.
In reality, any leadership contest will be a battle of voting blocs before individuals. That is a consequence of the one-country, one-vote system used to elect its presidents; it remains to be seen, for example, whether the eastern European and Nordic coalition that pushed Ceferin’s case for election in 2016 would be able to gather cohesively around a fresh contender.
There may yet be further aftershocks from the curious case of Zvonimir Boban, the former Uefa chief of football whose departure last month brought a war of words with his former friend Ceferin. The pair appear to differ over the president’s assertion that Boban had known of his exit plan. In any case, Boban may be missed in places that really matter. Although some sources play down his influence, others suggest he was instrumental in brokering the entente between Uefa and Fifa that helped usher through an expanded quadrennial Club World Cup from 2025. Uefa will require a dash of heavy diplomacy from somewhere should Fifa and its friends discover a taste for more frequent iterations of the 32-team event.
A recurring descriptor used by Ceferin’s allies is of a “no bullshit” operator: a straightforward, sometimes blunt individual unaccustomed to playing games. That characterisation has enough backing in respected places to be taken seriously. But it says plenty that some figures around the continent would not bat an eyelid if, down the line, Ceferin decided he should be best placed to lead Uefa through four more years of choppy waters in 2027. The soap opera may make compulsive viewing but the stench from last week’s sideshow in Paris may have troubling ramifications.
