
(ATR) Former FIFA president Sepp Blatter says he’s confident his six-year ban from football will be lifted.
"My name wouldn’t be Sepp Blatter if I didn’t have faith, if I wasn’t optimistic," he told reporters before entering the Court of Arbitration for Sport Thursday morning.
"I’m sure at the end.... that the [CAS] panel will understand that the payment made to Platini was really a debt that we [owed] him and this is a principle, if you have debts, you pay them," Blatter said.
Blatter resigned as the head of FIFA in June 2015 after 17 years at the helm and just four days after his reelection for a fifth term. Blatter was then handed an eight-year ban along with European football chief Michel Platini for ethics violations.
The FIFA appeals committee reduced the bans for both men to six-years for their services in growing the game of football around the world.
Platini has already taken his appeal to CAS that decided his ban would be further reduced to four years. He appeared at CAS on Thursday to provide testimony on Blatter's behalf.
Blatter is seeking a full pardon for his alleged ethics violations including a $2 million payment to Platini in 2011 for work done a decade prior to the payment.
CAS has not said when a decision will be made regarding Blatter’s appeal.
Written by Kevin Nutley
Forgeneral comments or questions, click here.
20 Years at #1: Your best source of news about theOlympics is AroundTheRings.com, for subscribersonly.
Últimas Noticias
Brigitte Henriques: “The important thing is that the women who are elected should be chosen for their ability, not because we are looking for modernization in terms of gender”
“When I was a girl I couldn’t find a club to play soccer in because most of them didn’t work with women,” Henriques tells Around the Rings during an in-depth interview in Crete, Greece.

The Hula Report: Winds of Change for ANOC in Crete
New leaders coming for peak Olympic group. Whether other candidates emerge in the months ahead, a contested election for the ANOC presidency will be a first for the organization.

Gilles Gilbert Gresenguet, presidential candidate for AFCNO: “We must take advantage of Paris 2024 to bring the Olympic Games back to French”
The elections take place November 18, and Abakar Djermah Aumi, president of the Chad Olympic Committee, is also aiming to win them.

USOPC announces 613-member 2020 U.S. Olympic Team

Roger Federer pulls out of Tokyo Olympics: "I am greatly disappointed"
(ATR) Federer cites "a setback with my knee" for the decision.
