UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions • Hacker News Board

Re: UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions

#151

Post by overfeed » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 7:46 PM UTC

vostrocity wrote: post #83

riffraff wrote: post #5

It's crazy that as despicable an organization as UEFA is, they're still far better than FIFA. Infantino has been a disgrace, I hope they manage to get rid of him, but I have very little hope.

I don't follow any sport, but I actually don't understand why UEFA and FIFA are non-profits when all the American leagues (MLB, NBA, NFL) are for-profit corporations. It seems to work well in America.

> It seems to work well in America.

Does it? Who does it work out well for? Franchises continuously extort tax-payer funds for stadia,some team switches host cities every few years, and the for-profit corporations are legal cartels that decides who gets to own a team. The number of ad-breaks is horrendous to anyone who's watched sports elsewhere.

Re: UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions

#152

Post by jimbokun » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 7:46 PM UTC

mgianluc76 wrote: post #59

Good calls. Honestly, the last World Cup already had way too many unwatchable matches before the quarterfinals. And the hydration pauses to sell more ads. And that halftime show during the final.

It was incredibly entertaining and I watched as many games as I could.

Re: UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions

#153

Post by jen20 » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 7:47 PM UTC

t0mpr1c3 wrote: post #130

Europe is where all the money is made in football. UEFA just want more of the pie. FIFA is a repulsive pit of corruption but UEFA isn't much better. Remember Blatter and Platini?

Blatter was president of FIFA, not UEFA.

Re: UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions

#154

Post by rsynnott » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 7:47 PM UTC

Okay, got to admit I did _not_ have “Trump breaks the World Cup” on my bingo card.

Re: UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions

#155

Post by igsomething » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 7:48 PM UTC

The same UEFA that added redundant matches and teams to the Champions League for money, and that came up with the Nations League because they wanted to extract more money from the national teams?

Re: UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions

#156

Post by ff10 » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 7:49 PM UTC

I secretly hope that Infantino goes ahead with it anyway. UEFA and others will form something new. Something that replaces the incredibly broken and corrupted FIFA with a de-facto and de-jure non-profit governing body.

Re: UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions

#157

Post by jotajota24 » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 7:49 PM UTC

tedggh wrote: post #142

Why is this out of the gate bad? Note that this is not taking FIFA to private equity, but creating an investors owned subsidiary to run events and commercial operations where the non profit arm will still own 80% of it. With the right protections it could help FIFA make more money and reinvest in the sport, particularly women’s football. FIFA currently makes 40% of what the NHL makes, not the NFL, not NBA. Soccer is…

Why is it bad to sell 20% of the biggest tournament in the world to a private company lead by people involved with the most corrupt administration in the history of the US? The model has been working fine for decades, why does it matter that it makes less than american sports?

Re: UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions

#158

Post by jimbokun » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 7:49 PM UTC

scaredreally wrote: post #14

ELI5? What are the factors and implications?

FIFA made ludicrous amounts of money as a non profit running the last World Cup and want to transition to a for profit corporation to make even more.

UEFA representing the European nations with the most competitive teams and many of the biggest stars, just told them good luck running a World Cup without us.

Re: UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions

#159

Post by paxys » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 7:50 PM UTC

ktallett wrote: post #6

The FA's worldwide don't need FIFA, they can set up a new world tournament. You will get a lot of poor nations who stick with FIFA for the cash but at the end of the day without European teams the world cup and FIFA will have minimal value. 5 of the last 6 world cup winners were european and it will only get more biased towards Europe. Argentina post Messi have no chance, and Brazil are the furthest away from winning…

FAs coming together and creating a new FIFA will just mean you get another organization that is exactly as corruption-ridden as FIFA. There's no point starting fresh if you don't fix the underlying problem.

Re: UEFA and its national associations will not participate in FIFA competitions

#160

Post by Normal_gaussian » Thu, Jul 30, 2026, 7:50 PM UTC

vostrocity wrote: post #83

riffraff wrote: post #5

It's crazy that as despicable an organization as UEFA is, they're still far better than FIFA. Infantino has been a disgrace, I hope they manage to get rid of him, but I have very little hope.

I don't follow any sport, but I actually don't understand why UEFA and FIFA are non-profits when all the American leagues (MLB, NBA, NFL) are for-profit corporations. It seems to work well in America.

MLB & NFL only changed to for-profit organisations somewhat recently (2007, 2015). afaict NBA has always been for-profit.

Internationally the standard is non-profits. Most sports have both their international organisations and highest standard of play organisations as non-profits - football, tennis, golf, cricket. The international components of baseball, american football, and basketball are all non-profits (though they are lower standards of play than the US internal leagues).