Greg Dyke: FA support for Platini bid not guaranteed

ENGLISH FA chairman Greg Dyke has said for the first time that the governing body will drop its backing for Michel Platini if FIFA’s ethics committee finds he behaved improperly.

UEFA president Platini and FIFA president Sepp Blatter have been handed 90-day provisional bans by the committee while investigations take place into a £1.35million payment to the Frenchman.

The action leaves Platini’s hopes of running to succeed Blatter in tatters. An FA statement merely said it was waiting for the outcome of the investigation - but Dyke said it is prepared to drop its support.

Dyke confirmed: “If the ethics committee reaches a conclusion that Mr Platini has not behaved properly or has behaved dishonestly then of course the FA will not support him.

“That’s why we said in our statement that we are awaiting the results of the investigation – we need to see the evidence. I can see why people are saying we should stop supporting him now, but we will follow what the ethics committee decides.

“Platini claims it’s a fix, but if they decide he has behaved improperly we will not support him and I’m sure I would have the backing of the FA board on that.”

Dyke also backed calls by International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach for independent candidates from outside football to be allowed to run for the FIFA presidency and said there was a need for radical reform.

He added: “We have a view of reform that is more radical than most which would certainly involve independent directors and could well involve a president from outside football. What we do not need is Mr Blatter Mark II.”

He added that if there was any finding of wrongdoing by the investigations into the bids for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups he was convinced there would have to be a re-vote.

“I have no doubt if the evidence comes out that a bid was won by corruption there will have to be a re-vote,” Dyke said. Bach declared “enough is enough” over the FIFA scandal and demanded that football’s world governing body considers a “credible external candidate” as president to help clean up the mess.

The IOC president said in a statement: “Enough is enough. We hope that now, finally, everyone at FIFA has at last understood that they cannot continue to remain passive.

“They must act swiftly to regain credibility because you cannot forever dissociate the credibility of FIFA from the credibility of football.

“FIFA must realise that this is now about more than just a list of candidates.

“This is also a structural problem and will not be solved simply by the election of a new president.

“They need to take action as soon as possible and must first accelerate and deepen the reform process in order to comply with accountability, transparency and all the principles of good governance, as expressed in our reform programme, Olympic Agenda 2020.”