The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) said it had invited both Platini and FIFA’s legal representatives to a hearing today “limited to the issue as to whether or not the provisional 90-day suspension imposed on M. Platini should be temporarily lifted”.
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He was accompanied by his Paris-based lawyers Thibaud d’Ales and Thomas Clay.
Blatter, who is the target of the Swiss criminal probe, has also been suspended for 90 days, with stiffer punishment from FIFA’s ethics committee also pending.
Both men deny any wrongdoing.
Sport’s highest appeal court has promised a decision by Friday “at the latest”. But we didn’t even know what salary the Federation Internationale de Football Association president Blatter, who was elected over our UEFA president Lennart Johansson, was on – why should we have taken any interest in what Platini was being paid?
It is known that Platini did have a written contract for 300,000 Swiss francs (£203,465) a year and was paid just over 1 million francs over three and a half years until he stepped down as Blatter’s technical advisor in 2002.
He has discussed details of evidence in the case in media interviews and appeared to break terms of the ban by entering UEFA headquarters in Nyon – for a minute’s silence after terror attacks on Paris – and UEFA issuing statements and news updates on his behalf.
But the 90-day suspension may prove to be the least of Platini’s problems.
The current suspension would finish on January 5 but if that is lifted by the Federation Internationale de Football Association watchdog, he would then have to pass an integrity test.
Infantino has said he would stand down if Platini is allowed to run in the election.
His lawyers will attend a preliminary hearing with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (Cas) on Tuesday.
Platini’s prospects of standing for Federation Internationale de Football Association presidency hang in the balance. Euro 2016 will be in France next June.
The 60-year-old later added on leaving: “You know I don’t like injustices”.
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