"If that means I lose my job, then so be it. I will understand and respect that decision. At least I'll sleep well tonight." Kevin Lamour said that on July 31. By August 17, he was gone.
FIFA confirmed that Lamour's tenure as Chief Operating Officer ended on 17 August 2026, three weeks after he went public with a damning statement accusing president Gianni Infantino of deceiving staff over the FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) proposal — a plan that would have opened up World Cup stakes to private investment. Lamour didn't just disagree with the policy. He told the Associated Press that FIFA employees had been "deceived" and called the FFE "the project of one person."
The FFE fallout keeps widening
Lamour's departure isn't an isolated incident. It follows the resignation of Carlos Cordeiro, Infantino's own senior advisor, who walked in July over the same FFE plans. Two senior exits in two months over a single proposal is not a governance blip — it's a pattern.
The FFE scheme was eventually abandoned, but the damage to FIFA's internal credibility is clearly still playing out. When your COO — someone who previously worked alongside Infantino at UEFA and knows how this world operates — feels compelled to go on record with the Associated Press rather than raise concerns internally, that tells you something about the climate at the top of world football's governing body.
FIFA's response was as corporate as you'd expect. A spokesperson confirmed the split, thanked Lamour for "two years of service," and added: "No further comment will be made on the matter." Secretary General Mattias Grafstrom sent an internal email to staff confirming the departure.
Lamour knew the consequences and said so publicly. The only question now is whether football's political leaders — his words — are actually listening.
