Platini Faces Life Ban

UEFA president Michel Platini is facing a life ban following a request from the FIFA ethics committee investigating an alleged irregular payment of £1.3million from world football’s governing body.

Platini and outgoing FIFA president Sepp Blatter will have formal hearings into allegations of FIFA’s ethics code breaches later this month over the payment made to the Frenchman in 2011.

The 60-year-old’s lawyer Thibaud d’Ales confirmed the maximum sanction was asked for when the ethics committee investigations unit submitted its final case report.

'The overreaching of the request really convinces us of this commission’s total lack of credibility,' said D’Ales.

'There is not a single tangible element in this case that can confirm the suspicions.'

Platini is currently serving a 90-day ban over a £1.3m payment of FIFA money he received in 2011 as backdated salary. He worked as a presidential adviser from 1998-2002 for Blatter, who also faces the ethics court’s judgment in the case.

Platini denies wrongdoing and says he had a verbal contract with Blatter to receive the money.

FIFA ethics judge Hans-Joachim Eckert is expected to give his verdicts in the cases of Platini and Blatter in December. Any sanctions can be challenged at the FIFA appeals Committee and Court of Arbitration for Sport.

D’Ales said he was informed of the ethics committee’s request on Monday and decided to make it public after it leaked in the French press.

He said FIFA’s aim is to prove that there was no contract between Platini and Blatter.

'Obviously we’ve got the proof that such a deal existed,' D’Ales said. 'We will submit it to CAS, which will handle the case within a fairly short space of time.'