Quote of the week
Gianni Infantino – revealing what first attracted him to a new $6.5bn-valued 48-team World Cup format which guarantees $5m grants for all 211 Fifa voting members: “It was a football decision.”
Stand of the week
Slaven Bilic – “let down and angry” with Dimitri Payet trying to leave West Ham: “He’s our best player and that’s why we gave him a long contract. We gave him everything, we were always there for him. I expect him to show commitment.”
(March 1997 – Harry Redknapp reveals he’s “bitter and angry “ with Slaven Bilic trying to leave West Ham: “He’s on a fantastic contract, the highest paid player in the club’s history. He signed it … Now he wants a move and feels Everton are a big club, so there’s nothing we can do. West Ham are a big club in our eyes, but he feels otherwise.” Bilic: “I had to do this. We are professionals – all players know, if anyone gets the chance of a big club, he must take it.”)
• Payet’s view on contract loyalty: Feb 2016, signing his new five-year £125k-a-week West Ham deal. “For me it’s a big step, an enormous show of faith from the chairman and from the manager. I thank them for that. I’m proud and I’m happy to prolong my adventure with West Ham… All is well. The love affair continues.”
Meanwhile: also wavering
Diego Costa: “unavailable” for Chelsea two weeks after his New Year message to fans: “I’m very happy, very content here... It’s good for us to have a manager who is not just a boss but a person we can talk to, someone whose support we can count on. We love him more all the time.”
• Antonio Conte’s view on 3 Jan: “Last summer Diego told me: ‘I stay, I stay, I want to fight for this club, for my team-mates, for this shirt,’ and now he’s showing great passion in the right way, in every moment. We’re happy for this: me, the club, the team-mates, because he’s completely focused. It’s very important, this.”
Other news: moment of the week
Monday: Fifa draw a line under 2014’s luxury watch scandal and prepare to hand out luxury watches to winners at the Fifa Best Awards in Zurich.
Tuesday: Fifa reveal all six watches worth €92,000 “went missing” before the show started. “We are looking into what happened.”
Most reassured
Uli Hoeness – paroled €27.2m tax evasion convict and reinstated Bayern president – on fitting back in to football: “I have become more reflective, tolerant and humble. But I think I still have a relatively good reputation in the international football world. It appears not to have suffered.”
Manager news: best belief
24 Nov, Oldham chairman Simon Corney on Stephen Robinson: “We’ve never had a harder-working manager, it’s just not been going for us. If anyone can’t see that, then I don’t know what they’re looking at. I believe in Stephen ... It might take six months, a year, or maybe two, to learn League One and the way it works, but he will get it right.” 12 Jan: Sacks him.
Zamparini latest
Italy, 6 Sep: Palermo owner Maurizio Zamparini hires coach Roberto de Zerbi.
28 Nov: Denies planning to sack him. “I am keeping De Zerbi, that is my decision.”
30 Nov: Sacks him for being “pitiful”, hires Eugenio Corini instead.
10 Jan: Loses faith in Corini and tries to rehire De Zerbi; De Zerbi says no.
Corini: “Every day here is like an atomic bomb, it’s like Hiroshima.” Zamparini: “It’s not easy to be president.”
Best vote of confidence
France: Montpellier owner Louis “Loulou” Nicollin on his coach Frédéric Hantz: “I’m angry with him. His team plays sad, sad football – I’m starting to be fed up to back teeth. But Hantz is not in danger. We can’t afford to fire him.”
Most speechless
Portugal: Sporting B coach João de Deus: reacting to his side conceding while celebrating a goal at the other end which was disallowed by a “mad late flag ... It seems we have entered an age of surrealism. I cannot find the words. It’s so terrible. For me, this ends it all.”
Best clarification
Italy: Sampdoria chairman Massimo Ferrero, clarifying what he meant by telling the press after a defeat to Napoli: “The referee stole it, incredible, the FA must expel him. I am truly pissed off, send these officials away. It is a robbery. In Italy robbery is a crime.” Two days later: “I don’t blame the referee and I have always defended referees. I have nothing against them.”
• Ferrero’s reflection on the incident: “When I am beside myself, I make trouble. It is my nature. He who is born round cannot die square.”
And most hopeful
Brazil: official Corinthians club model and Miss Bumbum 2016 winner Erika Canela, hoping her new tattoo of Donald Trump’s face will “change his views on women and immigrants”. “But I hope he doesn’t let me down and go down in history as a tyrant or something … I wouldn’t want that on my neck.”
