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Legendary Portuguese footballer Luis Figo offered a damning assessment of Gianni Infantino’s time in charge of FIFA on Wednesday as he called for the embattled president to resign from his role.
In a post on X, the former Real Madrid and Barcelona star said Infantino had “debased the office that he promised to elevate,” adding that he “lied, deceived and tried to feather his own nest at the expense of the game he is supposed to serve.”
“It is too late to save his dignity but it is not too late to save football. He should go. Now,” Figo wrote.
Infantino has been at the centre of a storm in the footballing world as FIFA faces backlash against its recently shelved plan to allow private investors to purchase stakes in major competitions, including the World Cup.
The proposal – which would have invited third parties to take minority, non-controlling investments in a new commercial subsidiary known as the FIFA Forward Enterprise – faced huge pushback from across the football community and beyond, with European governing body UEFA threatening to boycott future FIFA events and criticism from FIFA’s own chief operating officer.
On Saturday, Infantino announced that the investment plan was being scrapped, saying it had “created divisions” that were “no longer in the interest of the objective set out in the first place.”
But despite the announcement, it seems the damage had already been done.
The Welsh Football Association soon said it was withdrawing its support for Infantino’s presidential re-election bid, with the Serbian and Swedish FAs following suit.
Former Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger, who now works as FIFA’s chief of global football development, has also sought to distance himself from Infantino, who was first elected as president of the world football governing body in 2016.
In a statement, Wenger reportedly said that the decision to withdraw the investment plan was “absolutely necessary and beyond question.”
It comes as Infantino is set to hold a crisis meeting with senior FIFA officials in Morocco on Wednesday.
Infantino had already been facing a wave of criticism over FIFA’s handling of a number of incidents in the 2026 World Cup and his relationship with US President Donald Trump.