Socafan & Bakes...to reply to your posts jointly.
Maybe being English, I too have bias that I'm not aware of. But my point about the tail wagging the dog was not meant to be disrespectful, but more , descriptive. However we all feel about representation in CONCACAF, you cannot dismiss the fact that USA & Mexico are the regions footballing powers on the field. Therefore, the arrogance of these countries, while not acceptable, can be understood. Now if there truly was a one nation, one vote system in operation, these countries would find it hard to complain.
BUT THERES NOT. CFU consistently vote as a block. Their 25 votes out of 40 control CONCACAF. Now, of course, many countries in FIFA horse trade and lobby for votes, but aside from United Kingdom & Northern Ireland, there is no discernable "official" grouping other than CFU. I guess we assume that Jack pulls the CFU strings, and its no coincidence that bin Hammam met CFU outside of CONCACAF. So, like em or hate em, USA & Mexico must be pretty miffed because even if their proposals are good, they have to be accepted by CFU (read Jack) and I'm guessing thats why T&T gets so many advantages. I'm also guessing that other CFU nations put up with this because, as Bakes would put it, they get a little corn from the pockets.
Now you all can talk about slavery and disrespect etc all you want, but if you can't see how my analogy of a tail wagging a dog and my reference to the manipulation of one nation one vote was meant, then I feel I may have unwittingly missed something and I apologise if I've disrespected anyone on this site.
In my view the whole balance in world football is misaligned. Football is a sport where performance equals rewards. This is not so in FIFA administration. I would have EXCO members drawn from the top 20 nations in the FIFA lists averaged over 2 years. You would then have a "promotion & relegation" system. Of course, being a top 20 nation doesn't mean you can provide a top 20 administrator, but logic says that they must be pretty experienced. As a balance, the other 4 places could be selected by an "independent" panel.
Currently, these are the top 20:
1 Spain
2 Netherlands
3 Brazil
4 Germany
5 Argentina
6 England
7 Uruguay
8 Portugal
9 Italy
10 Croatia
11 Norway
12 Greece
13 Chile
14 Japan
15 Ghana
16 Serbia
17 Slovenia
18 Russia
19 France
20 Australia
But, no CONCACAF, only one African and one Asian, so thats where the 4 others should come from.
Now check the current EXCO:
Argentina
Cameroon
Trinidad & Tobago
Spain
France
Papua New Guinea
Jordan
Northern Ireland (I believe this represents the guaranteed UK spot)
Belgium
Brazil
Qatar
Turkey
USA
Thailand
Paraguay
Cyprus
Ivory Coast
Guatemala
Egypt
Russia
Algeria
Sri Lanka
Germany
Only 7 of the "top 20" nations represented. Why shouldn't Netherlands be represented when Papua New Guinea is?
Now I know you're all going to shoot me down and talk about equity and democracy and fair representation. But before you do, remember that WE don't get a choice. You can't earn a place on EXCO.
In the old days in England, the football association was similar to FIFA. Every chairman had an equal vote. Problem was, the 70 clubs below Division 1 outweighed the big boys. So the chairman of Doncaster Rovers carried the same weight as the Chairman of Man Utd, Liverpool, Arsenal etc. Traditionally, the boys from the North East (Leeds, Bradford, Sheffield etc) voted as a block. If you check how stagnated English football was up until the 90's you will understand my point. Clubs that never had the desire to reach Division One and play in Europe didn't give a s**t about making stadia safe and media friendly. They weren't interested in merchandising and executive boxes. They were old school mill owners smoking big cigars, driving jaguars and enjoying being king of their little hills.
The English Premier League is successful because the most successful clubs make the decisions. Of course, they make most of them to suit themselves, but every league club has benefitted. My club, Gillingham, will probably never play in the Premiership. But we have a completely refurbished stadium, and financially we can just about survive. (I remember we literally had a whip round amongst supporters to save the club back in the 80's. We once sold a player for a set of tracksuits!)
As much as I despise Man Utd, Chelsea, Arsenal etc for their money and bought success, I understand that they have saved English football and allowed my club to survive. After all, who would subscribe to Fox to watch Gillingham vs Sc**thorpe? Or Papua New Guinea vs Sri Lanka?
And by the way, I don't think UK should have an automatic spot on EXCO. It should be earned. But given the current administration, I'm glad its there!
Sorry, it always makes me laugh when the site automatically inserts *** into Sc**thorpe Scunny is so bad you can't even write their name