The president of soccer’s global governing body on Tuesday harshly criticized European broadcasters for not meeting FIFA’s demands for significantly higher television rights fees for this summer’s Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand. If the offers did not improve, he threatened, the tournament’s matches would not be televised in many of Europe’s biggest markets.
“It is our moral and legal obligation not to undersell the FIFA Women’s World Cup,” the president, Gianni Infantino, said in an appearance at the World Trade Organization in Geneva. “Therefore, should the offers continue not to be fair, we will be forced not to broadcast the FIFA Women’s World Cup into the ‘Big 5’ European countries,” he added. That group includes England, Germany, France, Spain and Italy — all of whom will send teams to the tournament.
Reeling off unverifiable figures, Infantino labeled the offers for the World Cup rights “a slap in the face” not only to the World Cup’s players but to women generally.
The comments escalated a fight Infantino opened last year, when he and FIFA rejected initial offers for rights to the women’s championship from several countries as far too low. At the time, he framed the battle as one over fairness, and he has since…
