FIFA hires top executive from UEFA as chief operating officer

GENEVA (AP) — FIFA made a high-profile signing from UEFA on Wednesday, hiring one of the most respected executives in European soccer.

Kevin Lamour, currently UEFA’s deputy general secretary, will join FIFA as chief operating officer on Nov. 1, soccer’s world body told staff on Wednesday in an email seen by The Associated Press.

The 44-year-old French official has worked at UEFA in two different spells since 2007 and gained a reputation as an advocate for good governance in soccer bodies.

The move to FIFA reunites Lamour with its president Gianni Infantino and secretary general Mattias Grafström. They worked together for several years at UEFA and on Infantino’s successful election campaign in 2016.

Lamour declined the chance to work for FIFA then, and soon returned to UEFA which he had left in 2015 after his longtime boss Michel Platini was investigated in financial wrongdoing with then-FIFA president Sepp Blatter.

Lamour was not implicated in that case and was back running the UEFA president’s executive office for the new incumbent, Aleksander Čeferin.

Though FIFA and UEFA have often had tense relations under Infantino and Čeferin, the FIFA message to staff Wednesday noted a “smooth and friendly transition while making Kevin available to us so quickly.”

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