2022 World Cup race ‘not clean’: Aus football chief

 Football Federation Australia chairman Frank Lowy on Wednesday said the race for the 2022 World Cup was “not clean” and he has shared what he knows with authorities.

“We ran a clean bid. I know that others did not, and I have shared what I know with the authorities, including Michael Garcia who undertook a two-year investigation into the 2022 World Cup bid,” he said in an open letter.

Australia was vying to host the 2022 tournament, which was controversially awarded to Qatar, along with the United States, Japan and South Korea.

Australia secured only one vote despite ploughing more than Aus 40 million (USD 31 million) into the bid and Lowy, the founder and head of global shopping centre empire Westfield, said it left a bitter taste.

“On a personal level, since December 2, 2010, when Australia received just one vote in its World Cup bid, I have nursed a bitter grievance,” he said, without detailing what evidence he had of corruption.

“We ran a clean bid and we are proud of that but it wasn’t a level playing field and therefore we didn’t win it. I will always be bitterly disappointed about the outcome.” His comments come with FIFA embroiled in two separate investigations by American and Swiss authorities into alleged rampant and long-running corruption within the organisation.