Aleksander Ceferin, the president of Slovenia’s football federation, was overwhelmingly elected as the new head of European soccer’s governing body UEFA at an extraordinary Congress on Wednesday.
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The 48-year-old received 42 of the 55 votes from UEFA members to defeat Dutch football administrator Michael van Praag to become the organization’s seventh president.
The Board of the Scottish FA can confirm its intention to vote for Aleksander Ceferin in the UEFA Presidential election in Athens tomorrow.
Ceferin said he will pursue Platini’s plan, which comes into effect in four years, for Champion League matches to be spread out across the continent. “My small but attractive Slovenia is also very proud, and I hope that one day, you will also be proud of me”.
“I hope one day you will be proud of me too”.
Michel Platini insisted his conscience was clear and he would continue the fight to overturn a Federation Internationale de Football Association ban in a farewell speech on Wednesday to European soccer leaders before his successor as UEFA president was elected.
Van Praag says “some people told me from the beginning that they would vote for me and then all of a sudden they turned their back to me”.
He first took a formal interest in local football in 2005 through his work with the executive board of KMN Svea Lesna Litija, one of Slovenia’s most successful futsal clubs.
Van Praag, who has said that UEFA must cut costs, said it was not his decision to hold the event in such extravagant surroundings. “I also want to clarify that I do not want criticise those who did not support me, each being entitled to have their own convictions”.
“Not a household name by any means, Ceferin went from rank outsider to overwhelming favourite within a matter of months after securing support from Uefa’s small and medium-sized member associations”, says the paper.
“I think it was in Italy that Aleksander took to the floor and said “we are not enemies”.
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The session was somewhat controversially opened by Platini, who remains banned for four years but had been granted special permission by FIFA’s ethics committee to bid farewell to the organisation he has run since 2007 as a “gesture of humanity”. “What I did is make sure we did not have a Super League, by going twice to Mr Rummenigge and talking some sense into him”. “I have a clear conscience, I have not made mistakes and will continue my fight in court”.
