FIFA leader Infantino aims to name deputy within months

Photo credit: AFP

Budapest (AFP) – FIFA president Gianni Infantino said Tuesday he is aiming to name a secretary general within months and already has “a couple” of names in mind.

Infantino, who was elected in February to take over leadership of football’s scandal-tainted world body, said that his new deputy would not be European.

Infantino told reporters on the sidelines of a UEFA congress in Budapest that the position would not be filled in time for a FIFA congress to be held in Mexico City on May 13.

“I am speaking to people, contacts have started, I have a couple of people in mind,” Infantino said without naming any candidates.

He predicted that he would make a proposal on the candidate to FIFA’s ruling council in the weeks after the congress.

Infantino told the UEFA meeting that he wanted the world body to become “a FIFA of honesty” as he seeks a new era putting behind the scandals that tainted his predecessor Sepp Blatter and sacked secretary general Jerome Valcke.