Two months ago plenty of people in football thought Gianni Infantino was finished. Today, with 40 days to go until nominations close for next year's Fifa presidential election, senior figures in the game believe he may not face an opponent at all. That is the picture BBC Sport has painted, and it says a good deal about how Fifa's voting system works compared with the way European football sees it.
From crisis to coronation
The trouble began with the Fifa Forward Enterprise proposal, known as FFE, a plan to sell off commercial rights to the World Cup to a private equity firm. When the news broke it looked like the end of Infantino's reign. Uefa certainly thought so, and saw FFE as the chance to cut the head off the snake. The scheme was scrapped, but the president stayed.
The nominations deadline is 18 November, and the election would be held at the Fifa Congress in Rabat on 18 March. If nobody gets on the ballot, that is a coronation rather than a contest. Infantino, 56, has spent the weeks since a Fifa management board meeting in Rabat on 5 August touring the world: the inauguration of Colombia's new president, a youth tournament in the Dominican Republic, the Fifa Asean Cup final in Jakarta, and this week an African football conference in Cape Verde.
The map behind the maths
The split inside world football is rough but clear. Uefa, Concacaf and Asia are against Infantino. Africa, South America and Oceania are for him. That means he could be returned with the support of only about half of Fifa's 211 members. Money is the reason his position is so hard to attack. "We have invested one billion dollars in 10 years in Africa," he told delegates in Cape Verde, where the 54 African nations, carrying more than a quarter of the votes, pledged unconditional support for the third time this year.
Europe, by comparison, has 55 votes. The challenger Uefa wanted was Victor Montagliani, the Concacaf president, who was seen as a credible non-European who could unite the opposition. But the Canadian never said publicly that he wanted the job, and he has now told staff he intends to stand for re-election at Concacaf. The only declared candidate is Ramon Vega, the former Tottenham and Switzerland defender, and as in the last cycle it seems unlikely he will collect the five letters of support from member associations that he needs.
What Uefa has left
History is against a challenger. Fifa has had five presidents in 65 years, and only once, when Sir Stanley Rous of England lost in 1974, has an incumbent been beaten at the ballot box. BBC Sport understands Uefa accepted internally some time ago that there was little chance of removing Infantino democratically. It had one tool, a threat to boycott Fifa competitions, and has since withdrawn it. Within hours of that, it lodged claims in three US courts seeking documents relating to FFE. If anything incriminating turns up, Uefa intends to pursue criminal mismanagement through the Swiss courts, hoping to force him out.
The next test comes on Thursday, when the Fifa Council meets in Zurich and Infantino faces his fiercest critics for the first time. FFE will be on the table, along with the Fifa Peace Prize given to Donald Trump and the US president's later intervention over Folarin Balogun's red card at the World Cup. Uefa president Aleksander Ceferin, who confirmed on Wednesday that he will seek a fourth term, is expected to attend in person. Infantino has softened his tone since August. "When you go through a journey, sometimes concerns are raised," he said in Cape Verde, promising to answer them with "open arms, an open heart and an open mind".
Key dates: Fifa Council meeting in Zurich, Thursday 15 October 2026. Nominations deadline for the Fifa presidency: 18 November 2026. Election at the Fifa Congress in Rabat: 18 March 2027. Source: BBC Sport analysis published 9 October 2026.
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