MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Another Frenchman, Jerome Champagne enters race to replace FIFA's Blatter
Champagne ran for FIFA presidency earlier this year but didn’t make the ballot sheet because he failed to get the required five nominations from federations Jerome Champagne has entered the race to replace Sepp Blatter as FIFA president, his second attempt in a year. The former FIFA deputy secretary general announced his intentions on Friday, three days before the deadline for candidacies.
Champagne ran for the FIFA presidency earlier this year but didn’t make the ballot sheet for the May election because he failed to get the required five nominations from federations. However this time allegedly he has eight associations supporting his bid from three continents.
Asked it he thought he had a better chance now, he said: “Only time will tell. But it is clearer that we need some fresh air. We need real platforms not a long list of slogans.”
“The events of the past few months have renewed my determination to be a candidate,” Champagne said in the seven-page manifesto he has sent to FIFA's 209 member associations.
“We need to save FIFA and its role of governance and redistribution, which is in danger at a time when they are needed the most,” he said. “We must also restore FIFA's credibility, and prepare it for the challenges of an ever evolving world.”
Champagne is positioning himself as a ‘clean’ candidate following the suspension of Blatter, UEFA president Michel Platini, FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke, ongoing investigations into six other officials over corruption and probes into a $150 million bribery scandal.
“I have no connection with the issues surrounding the December 2010 vote [hit by a string of scandals] nor the special interest groups trying again to take control of FIFA,” he said.
Among a list of eight pledges, Champagne vows to adapt the governance of FIFA and modernize its administration, apply the highest standards of transparency and ethics, boost development programs and elevate women’s football.
“My wish is to bring stability, reconciliation, competency, modesty, willingness to listen, inclusion, openness, knowledge of FIFA, of football and the world,” he said.
Champagne joins Jordan’s Prince Ali bin al-Hussein and former Trinidad and Tobago player David Nakhid as presidential contenders who have filed paperwork with FIFA ahead of the Oct. 26 deadline.
Asian Football Confederation president Sheikh Salman Bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa and former South African government minister Tokyo Sexwale are mulling bids.
Champagne expressed disappointment at the controversies surrounding the FIFA presidential campaign so far.
“At a time when FIFA, our FIFA, needs more than ever an open debate about its future, its reform and the reform of football, we are witnessing the first months of the electoral campaign being dominated by controversy and deals made behind closed doors,” he said.
He is calling again for TV debates about the future of FIFA involving all candidates –in December, January and February.
“You, presidents and officers of national associations who will vote during the next election, deserve to participate in this debate, as well as all the other protagonists and lovers of the round ball,” he said in the letter to federations.
“You have the right to know to whom, and for what, you are entrusting your support. FIFA also deserves a proper debate about its future. Errors have been made and they must be corrected with no weakness, but justly and without a whitewash.”
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Read all commentsSo a frog wants to be the Chief Crook of FIFA. Mmm, lets look at what happened to some other frogs that wanted things they shouldn't have.
Oct 24th, 2015 - 06:45 pm 0Tomorrow, Sunday 25th October 1415, is the 600th anniversary of Agincourt.
For all the argie numbnuts who have never heard of, or do not know what Agincourt is, it was a famous battle where a total force of 5,000 English and Welsh Knights, men at arms and LONGBOWMEN defeated 30k – 100k Frogs.
The Frogs didn't even know the total of their own force but they DID know they had 4,500 Frog knights fully equipped for the field. This means massive, armoured horses with armoured knights and all their retinue (not all of whom would be combatants). The 25,500 - 95,500 other frogs would be a mixture of all sorts including mercenary forces.
But who really defeated this overwhelming frog force: THE LONGBOWMEN OF ENGLAND, that's who. Having crossed the ENGLISH channel and marched overland the deciding battle saw 4,500 frog knights poncing around at the front of their forces taunting the English and Welsh to draw into battle.
So they opened up with the longbowmen, using the good old tried and tested longbow with arrows having bodkin points. A bodkin is a six inch (150mm) 1/4 inch square sectioned steel NAIL with a pyramidal sharpened point.
Oh how the mighty were fallen when the arrows rained down on the frogs. Their utter belief in the armour they wore was soon dispelled when the bodkins went through the breastplates and through hearts, lungs and all the other major organs. Utter surprise must then have given way to utter panic as the major blood vessels were rent apart and the body cavity itself started to fill up with blood.
Shock would then start to take over their frog pride and belief in their own invincibility followed by a massive drop in body temperature and an unstoppable advance in restricted breathing to the point where the frog brains started to close down. By then they were as dead as frogs without their legs!
#1
Oct 27th, 2015 - 12:58 pm 0A good account of the battle can be read in Bernard Cornwell's Azincourt following the tale of Thomas Hookton, an English archer.
“However, a recent study by Professor Anne Curry gives a different perspective to the numbers involved
QUOTE:-
Agincourt is often regarded as such a success because the English were supposedly hopelessly outnumbered, but this traditional image is now under threat from new research. In her book Agincourt; A New History, Anne Curry offers insights in to her research on numbers at the battle of Agincourt. As part of this research, Professor Curry has compiled a database listing the name of every soldier who fought in the Hundred Years War, and from this research she has been able to lay claim to the figures for 9,000 soldiers for the English and 12,000 for the French”
The effectiveness of the arrow shower was that it broke up the cavalry charge by killing or wounding the horses Horses carreering or crashing into each other would unseat the knights who were almost useless on the ground.
In retrospect, the French lost the battle rather than the English winning it.
I think initially the archers used broadhead arrows to pierce the horseflesh, changing to bodkins when the range came down below 100 yards.
@ 2 Clyde15
Oct 27th, 2015 - 06:25 pm 0Yes I read the sales pitch as well.
Interesting that the “French lost the battle rather than the English winning it.”
Mmmm. I bet you wish you had “won” a few battles like this even if you thought you were going to lose, I know I would.
As far as I can tell the book by Anne Curry is out there on it's own for this approach. Perhaps it was from a woman's perspective, cue accusations of misogyny from a certain person.
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