Fifa crisis: Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini could receive longer bans as Ethics Committee signals intention to appeal
Disgraced former Fifa president Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini could yet be banned from football's governing body for life after internal ethics investigators signalled their intention to appeal to extend their existing suspensions.
The two men were handed eight-year bans from Fifa in December by four Ethics judges over a £1.3m payment Blatter made to Uefa president Platini in 2011 for work performed nine years earlier.
Both have signalled their intention to appeal their bans and maintain their innocence but members of the Fifa Ethics Committee investigatory chamber – who probed the nature of the backdated payment – appear to believe the punishment did go far enough.
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A spokesperson for the group told the Press Association: "I can confirm that we intend to appeal".
Blatter, Platini and the investigatory chamber's appeals will now be referred to Fifa's Appeals Committee and could then go to the Court of Arbitration for Sport if the parties involved remain unsatisfied.