Michel Platini received a major blow to his FIFA presidential ambitions when the English Football Association suspended support for the embattled UEFA chief after learning new information on his legal battle.
Earlier, the 60-year-old Frenchman was given a provisional 90-day ban by the ethics committee of the world football’s governing body over claims that he had received a ‘disloyal payment’ of two million swiss dollars from football chief Sepp Blatter in 2011.
The FA stated that it had learned more information relating to the ongoing issue from Platini lawyers and thereby it has decided to suspend its support for Platini’s candidature for the FIFA presidency until the legal process has been concluded and the position is clear.
However, the FA declined to divulge more information on it, saying that they had been instructed to keep the information confidential and therefore couldn’t go into specifics.
Platini had been considered as the favourite to succeed Blatter as FIFA president until he was named in a criminal investigation alongside the former in Switzerland.
FIFA plunged into an unprecedented crisis when Swiss prosecutors opened criminal proceedings against embattled Blatter last month over allegations that he sold World Cup TV rights to disgraced former FIFA vice-president Jack Warner for 20 times below their true value.
