‘Miffed’ England accuses Fifa members of ‘reneging on commitments’ in failed WC bid

LONDON - England has accused the Fifa executive committee members of lying after they suffered a humiliating defeat in the race to host the 2018 football World Cup that saw them poll just two votes, one of which came from bid chairman Geoff Thompson.

England bid chief executive Andy Anson said that Fifa members had reneged on commitments given in the build-up to the vote after Russia stormed to a resounding win.

The England 2018 bid committee was confident that they had a fighting chance of securing up to seven votes in the first round, a core that could have given them a platform for victory, The Telegraph reports.

Asked if he felt members had lied to the bid about their support, Anson said: “I do feel people let us down, I’d be lying if I said they didn’t. People who promised us our vote obviously went the other way.”

“I honestly felt that we had enough comfort, enough people, enough room to hope that things would go alright and we would go through the first round,” he said.

Thompson said: “I cannot believe what has happened, and I am naturally very, very disappointed. The votes that were promised clearly didn’t materialise. I never imagined we would go out in the first round.”

Among the voters who abandoned England was Trinidad’s Jack Warner, who is understood to have told Prince William at a meeting in Zurich this week that England had secured his vote.

The choice of Russia and the resounding success of Qatar, the two bids with the largest budgets and the lowest marks in Fifa’s technical assessment, also brought questions over the decision.(ANI)