oldtype

Aye, it was all part of his evil masterplan - the bloke's like Emperor Palpatine, weaving his web of deceit and corruption through exploiting the weak. It's all politics and he was good at it while other people were shit. Would have been nicer if he could have pulled it off without all the money exchanging hands, of course.

One country one vote is the standard for international organizations and I don't understand why that should be different for FIFA. Anyone else from Europe was just as capable as Blatter of catering to and influencing the smaller footballing nations from Asia/Africa if they chose to do so. It's just that Blatter was the first one to ever actually give a shit about us instead of assuming we were just shitty backwater places that deserved the occasional charity appearance at the World Cup and nothing more.

I doubt the job involves a lot of legwork for Carr. By and large the players he brings to the club aren't unknown quantities. I'd assume his responsibilities are mostly just networking and setting the club up with contacts when they target a player in France. Seems like a pretty decent semi-retirement job.

They probably just sit around in a boardroom sipping a $10,000 bottle of wine, reading this thread and giggling to themselves about how some people think we're going to hire a manager.

If this is the sort of business the US plans on wading into, I for one welcome our American overlords.

I'm working at a law firm in DC at the moment and I was talking to one of our experienced litigation partners about this last night. He mentioned that the prosecution team DOJ had assembled for this case was basically all of their superstar lawyers, and just seeing that list of names made him 100% confident that FIFA was fucked. These guys are taking this very seriously.

How many times have we had the local journos set these arbitrary timeframes on things we desperately want only for them to amount to nothing? I refuse to believe that we'll have any sort of results by next week and I also refuse to believe that we'll end up with anybody but John Carver as our head coach on the first day of the season.

Probably knows that we're not interested in finding a manager at all, so it's safe to just deny everything.

How dare we even dream

Right, how about we just buy the best players available to us. Radical concept i know.

Right, we're not saying that every location has to be perfect in every way. Just as long as it isn't a tiny state AND has a record of horrific human rights abuses AND has no footballing tradition whatsoever AND is a billion degrees in the summer.

Yup, probably just met the Palermo oldtype. I certainly met the Majorca oldtype in a bar a few years back. He was born and bred on the island but Toon mad and proudly wearing the black and white with "Josep 9" on the back. There are crazy people everywhere

Yup, probably just met the Palermo oldtype.

Should produce some fun memes at least

If they were going to sack Carver quickly for being terrible they would have done it already.

Personally think it should be held in Asia every year.

I can't remember the last time I was in such a good mood reading the football forum

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2015/05/27/world/americas/ap-soc-fifa-raids-trinidad.html?_r=0 Looks like they had all they had all the extradition stuff pre-planned before they went public too. So badass

I feel like this is the one time that waterboarding is definitely justified.

What sort of things specifically are you curious about? For instance how serious are they to push for real punishment? The DOJ's conviction rate is like 93%, the only way people will get out of serious punishment is by informing the investigation. I really don't see anyway Blatter remains president by the time this is over. This is also a good point. The DOJ basically never brings these charges unless they're sure they have you cold. Basically everyone takes a plea bargain because they threaten you with dozens of years of prison otherwise.

What sort of things specifically are you curious about? For instance how serious are they to push for real punishment? I would guess very serious. The Obama administration in general has been pretty hawkish on foreign entities engaging in corrupt practices on US soil/in connection with the US market. The amount of time and effort DOJ have put into this case indicate that they're out for blood. The indictment states that each of these guys could face 20 years+ on some combination of RICO charges, money laundering, wire fraud, tax evasion, and bribery (with bonus points for criminal conspiracy.) Just based off what I've seen, that level of sentencing don't seem outlandish at all if they don't cooperate. Realistically, most will probably work out some kind of plea deal in which they agree not to defend themselves and also provide information in exchange for less serious charges. This is why I'm holding out some hope that the US authorities will work their way even higher up the FIFA totem pole. The one wrinkle in this is probably extradition. I'm not aware of where these people are at the moment and how many of them are already in American hands. Depending on where they're holed up and what sort of treaty the US has with those countries extradition may take a significant amount of time.

What sort of things specifically are you curious about?

I imagine these assholes locked in a dark room at DOJ with some prosecutor lighting a fire under their asses to knock their sentence down from 20 years to five by handing over information on Blatter

Maybe they'll do fuck all and put the head cone stacker in charge for a few months forever. FYP

Don't think that will happen. Think some of the big guys are going down, hopefully Marin is one of them. Wonder what happens with the others. Owner of Traffic Sports has already pleaded guilty and forfeited $25m dollars, he will forfeit another $126m. So there is definitely been wrong doing up top and many will be charged. I agree that a few known people will take charges, but I seriously doubt this investigation achieves anything more than getting a few individuals to fall on their sword. Do you see FIFA being affected or deterred in any way? Hopefully, obviously I don't think someone like Blatter will fall, but I do expect it to shake it up a little. Let's hope the FBI, can do something, this is what movies are made out of. This is not going to just blow over. DOJ would not be bringing these charges unless it intended on doing some serious damage. Maybe Blatter will survive, but many of his key minions are looking at serious jail time and that alone should be enough to deter FIFA from pulling similar shit in the future. It's so incredibly satisfying that they've finally run into something they can't bribe or bully their way out of. FIFA may be a big fish, but they're nothing compared to the good 'ol US of A.