ZURICH — At dawn on Wednesday, Sunil Gulati, the president of US Soccer, woke with a start, his phone buzzing on the desk of his room at a luxury hotel here. A police raid was quietly going on in the halls around him, and some of Gulati’s closest professional colleagues — a few of them his friends — were being arrested on various charges related to corruption. The calls and texts did not stop for hours.
Gulati, who is also a member of FIFA’s powerful executive committee, said his emotions were mixed as he read and talked about the news. “Shock and disappointment were first,” he said. “Then, very soon after, came anger.”
That anger, he added, only confirmed a decision he made months ago: On Friday, when one delegate from each of FIFA’s 209 member nations casts a vote for the next FIFA president, Gulati will instruct the United States delegate to vote against the longtime incumbent, Sepp Blatter, and vote instead for the only other candidate, Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan.
Gulati, in an interview Thursday, said he knows that doing so might have repercussions for US Soccer in the future, especially if Blatter, as expected, wins a fifth term as FIFA president. Anti-American sentiment is not unusual in international sports, and the involvement of the Department of Justice in Wednesday’s arrests will not help the United States’s image.
Under Blatter, too, FIFA has often operated with a culture of “retribution,” as al-Hussein once put it, which could make it more difficult for US Soccer to find allies in the future. But Gulati has decided that voting in favor of change at FIFA is the most important priority of all, even if it could hurt the US in future bids to host a World Cup.
It is not a decision he undertook lightly — he said he discussed it with a few US Soccer board members before helping al-Hussein’s bid for the presidency get underway in January — but it is one he believes is critical.
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“Would I like to see the United States host a World Cup in the future?” Gulati said. “The answer is, of course, yes. But for me, and for US soccer, better governance and more integrity at CONCACAF and FIFA are far more important than hosting any international soccer tournament,” referring to the North and Central American soccer federation.
He added: “I’m sure there are some people who would disagree with that decision and would prioritize things differently. But this is how we feel, and we are doing what we think is right. If being on the right side of issues costs us from hosting a World Cup in the future, that would be unfortunate. But we are prepared to deal with that.”
The hosting rights for the 2026 World Cup — the 2018 tournament will be in Russia and the 2022 event is scheduled for Qatar — will be awarded in 2017. It is difficult to predict how FIFA will look by then, but Gulati is hopeful that al-Hussein, instead of Blatter, will be leading something close to a wholesale change in the organization.
Gulati also said he had convinced the Canadian soccer federation to join him in backing al-Hussein, who has campaigned largely on a platform of reform.
“We like many of the things he stands for and has done,” Gulati said. When it was noted that al-Hussein is considered a significant underdog to Blatter, who has held the FIFA presidency since 1998, Gulati shrugged.
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“Being on the wrong side of an election result — if that’s what happens — is not necessarily being on the wrong side,” he said. “If you are serious about change, you have to be willing to push for it.”