Michel Platini has backed a fresh vote on the 2022 World Cup if proof ever emerged of corruption in the awarding of Qatar as the venue.

“As for Qatar 2022, I wasn’t influenced,” the UEFA president and FIFA vice-president who voted for the Gulf state told TF1 television in France. “As far as I’m concerned, the vote was held in all transparency and we’ve always said that in the event of the slightest hint of corruption there’ll be a new vote.

“But for now, we don’t know.”

The head of European football has never disguised the fact that he voted for Qatar in a move to help develop football in parts of the world where the World Cup has never been staged.

Since the vote he has campaigned for a switch to hold the sport’s showcase in the winter rather than summer months to avoid the stifling temperatures.

Russia in 2018 and Qatar were awarded the World Cup staging rights after a voting process dogged by allegations of corruption.
Last month FIFA received the findings of an inquiry into the votes by FIFA’s ethical commission.

The man spearheading allegations of corruption into the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bids has called for FIFA to make the results public.

Former US federal prosecutor Michael Garcia, who has notably been looking into the way Qatar won the right to host the 2022 tournament, made his appeal last month on the eve of a two-day FIFA Executive Committee meeting being held in Zurich.

Meanwhile,  a senior figure in Asian football has been banned for five years for “soliciting and accepting” bribes from former FIFA executive Mohamed Bin Hammam.

Ganbold Buyannemekh, the head of the Mongolian FA and a former member of the Asian football confederation’s executive committee, was banned by FIFA’s ethics committee for accepting the payments to back Bin Hammam’s campaign for the FIFA presidency in 2011.

He also accepted money from Bin Hammam when he was involved in an election to FIFA’s executive committee in 2009, narrowly beating Sheikh Salman Bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa – the current AFC president – by 23 votes to 21.

Bin Hammam’s challenge against Sepp Blatter for the FIFA presidency ended weeks before the vote after allegations surfaced of payments to officials in the Caribbean. He was later banned for life by FIFA’s ethics committee.