Appointments made to Australia's World Cup Bid Team

Football Federation Australia (FFA) has appointed Rod Allen as Head of Media Relations and Joanna Burns to manage overseas events and coordinate international communications. It also appointed Square1 Sports Ltd to bolster its advocacy team.

Allen will report to FFA Chief Executive Ben Buckley and be responsible for all aspects of FFA media, community and public relations and the local media aspects of FFA's World Cup bid. Burns, a founding partner of UK consultancy firm Alexander Ross Ltd, will manage all international relations aspects of the Bid from London.

With an increasing level of media, advocacy and communications work to be undertaken outside Australia, the FFA also decided to engage London sport and communications consultancy company Square1 Sports Ltd.

Locally, the FFA's Bonita Mersiades made a surprise exit from her role as Head of Corporate Affairs on Friday.

Meanwhile, Australia's bid to host the 2018 FIFA World Cup would seem to have been undermined by FIFA President Sepp Blatter announcing that a deal is being discussed where only European nations would bid to host the 2018 World Cup.

Blatter said he had talked over the deal proposal with Michel Platini, President of UEFA, European football's governing body.

Russia, England, Spain-Portugal and Netherlands-Belgium are the four European bids to stage either the 2018 or 2022 event. Australia, Japan and United States have also bid for either 2018 for 2022 and South Korea, Indonesia and Qatar have all applied to host the 2022 World Cup only.

"There is a movement at the moment among the various candidates that in the end it would be a good solution ... if the candidates for 2018 would only be those from Europe," Blatter said, as quoted by Reuters.

"It's not been finally decided but it's the idea, also to make the work of FIFA easier and especially that of the executive committee. It would also possibly make the work of the different organisations applying for the World Cup easier."

It has long been felt that, with the 2010 World Cup being in South Africa and the 2014 event being in Brazil, the 2018 World Cup would be held in Europe, with Australia and its Asian rivals having a better chance of earning hosting rights in 2022. 

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