Last week, Victor Montagliani was one of Gianni Infantino's most loyal defenders at the top of world football. This week, he might be the man who replaces him.
The CONCACAF president — Vancouver-based, Italian-Canadian, fluent in four languages — is now openly touted as a front-runner in the race for FIFA's presidency ahead of the March election. It's a dramatic turn for someone who was literally praising Infantino in Italian at the FIFA Congress in April. Then came last Saturday's statement from CONCACAF, which Montagliani chaired, calling Infantino's plan to sell a 20-per-cent World Cup stake an "egregious act of poor governance and leadership" and demanding "a comprehensive reckoning with this presidency." That's not diplomatic grumbling. That's a declaration.
The making of a candidate
Montagliani has never publicly said he wants the top job. But former Canada Soccer board members told the Globe and Mail he's mused about a Canadian FIFA president for years — and his April congress speech reads differently now with that context. "Leadership is not about power. Leadership is about service. It's about making decisions for the many, not the few." In a room full of people who know exactly what the opposite looks like, that lands as more than a platitude.
His CV is legitimate. He was parachuted into CONCACAF in 2015 after a wave of U.S. Department of Justice indictments gutted its leadership — and he actually cleaned the place up. Three presidential wins, two by acclamation. He unified a confederation historically fractured along North American, Central American, and Caribbean lines. That's genuinely difficult political work in a sport famous for regional self-interest.
Prime Minister Mark Carney called him "a credit to Canada, credit to football" on Wednesday. That's the kind of endorsement that doesn't hurt when you're trying to convince 211 national associations you're a safe pair of hands.
FIFA's crisis is getting worse, not better
Infantino's attempt at damage control hasn't worked. A Wednesday meeting with senior FIFA staff in Morocco produced a statement backing the president and warning critics that FIFA would "not tolerate any attacks on its integrity" — which is a bold line for an organisation currently being accused of selling off its crown jewel to private investors without consultation.
UEFA responded the next day by reiterating its boycott of FIFA competitions, saying its conditions — including guarantees that the World Cup stake sale will never be attempted again — had not been met. The next FIFA event is the U-20 Women's World Cup in Poland, kicking off September 5. That's the immediate flashpoint.
Nominations for the presidency close November 18. Montagliani hasn't declared. His spokesperson said this week he was unavailable for comment. But "I'll let the future take care of itself," as he put it in June, sounds a lot less like a non-answer now than it did then.
