Infantino opens the Dubai International Sports Conference
On Sunday 27th the President of the Dúbai Sports Council, Sheikh Mansour bin Mohamed, welcomed the participants to the International Sports Conference held in the city. A global initiative that this year took place under the theme "Football at the top" at the Armani Hotel located in the highest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa skyscraper.
The event, which has been held annually since 2006, includes discussions on the development of sport at national, regional and international levels. Authorities such as the Director General of the Dubai Health Authority and Vice-President of the National Olympic Committee, Humaid al-Qatami, and the Secretary General of the Dubai Sports Council, Saeed Hareb, attended. Heads of sports federations, club directors and representatives of local and international media were also among the audience.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino spoke at the start of the ceremony. He described football as a beacon of hope and a harbinger of peace, unity and solidarity as the world recovers from the disruption and desolation caused by COVID-19 pandemic.
"I have been coming to this Conference quite a few times, but I think this year is a special year, and the fact we are here united and reunited, marks a little step – not yet into normality – but a little step into the right direction and that’s why it is so important for us and for you to be here, and I would like to thank you all for being here", said Infantino.
The FIFA President wanted to thank the health staff and volunteers who have been at the forefront of the fight against the pandemic and to remember the victims of the virus.
Infantino wanted to convey a message of hope to the fans, who will sooner or later be able to enjoy themselves in the stadiums again. "We are playing in front of empty stadiums, but there are millions that are watching you. We will all work together to bring back spectators, safely of course, into stadiums because that is what we are about".
In his speech he also referred to the $1.5 billion COVID-19 Aid Plan that FIFA has set up to benefit 211 member associations and six confederations in order to alleviate the financial impact of the pandemic. "In FIFA, we have tried to help a little bit," Infantino said. "We have created, as you might have heard, the COVID-19 Relief package worth USD1.5 billion to help, not the top professional game, but to help the game all over the world in 211 countries –the grassroots game, the women’s game stay alive, to keep the flame of football burning".
Infantino encouraged a rethinking of football and the planning of a truly global game. "But this period where we have been locked down has also given us possibilities to think about the future of football, of course. With football being the most important of the less important things, maybe we need to start reconsidering the way we have been organising football so far", he said.
"We need to protect – and that’s the first priority – we need to protect the players, the legends. We need to protect the game. Maybe we need to look again at the formats of our competitions and we need to see how we can find a better balance between national teams and clubs, between leagues and cups, between long competitions and short. Maybe this is the time where we need to reduce a little bit travel in order to preserve health," he continued.
He also stressed the need to question what FIFA, the federations and the leagues have been doing for the last 40 years. "Because the world is changing, because the world is going faster, the world wants more excitement; the youth, the young boys and girls, they strive for maybe a different type of organisation of competitions as we are used to".
"Football is global," Infanino added. "The fact we are here today in Dubai which is a global city, is a testimony of that. And the vision of FIFA is certainly to make football even more global than what it is today. Because even if football is global, the reality is that it is concentrated, of course, in a few countries only and we need to make this bigger with new ideas", he added "this is the task, this is the mission of FIFA, of course, to organise, to generate, to distribute revenues in the entire world. This is what we are try to do with the help of all those who are partnering with us".
"So we need to put all this on the table and this will be the challenge of the year 2021 and the following years to come for us in global football," he concluded.
In his speech, the FIFA President also took the opportunity to remember two football legends who left us this year, the Argentinean Diego Maradona and the Italian Paolo Rossi.
Among the footballers present at the ceremony were Cristiano Ronaldo, Iker Casillas and the winner of The Best Player of the Year award, Bayern striker Robert Lewandowski.
