Michel Platini Faces Life Ban From Football

Michel Platini is facing a life ban from football after FIFA's ethics committee recommended the sanction for accepting a £1.3m "dishonest payment" from Sepp Blatter.

Sources close to Mr Platini told Sky News that, according to correspondence received by the Frenchman’s lawyer, ethics committee investigators will seek a lifetime ban at a hearing next month.

Platini and suspended FIFA President Sepp Blatter face formal hearings into allegations that the payment, made in 2011, breached the Code of Ethics.

Both men claim that the payment, made three months before the 2011 FIFA presidential election, was for work Platini carried out between 1999 and 2002, but did not present an invoice for until nine years later.

It is not clear what sanction has been recommended against Mr Blatter, but he could face a similar penalty. One source described the case against the two men as "very similar".

FIFA's ethics committee refused to comment and Platini's legal team had not responded at time of publication.

At the hearing German judge Hans-Joachim Eckert, chairman of the ethics committee’s adjudicatory chamber, will decide if the case against them is proven, and what sanction to impose.

Platini’s lawyer Thibaud D'Ales described the proposed sanction as "a scandal".

"The overreaching of the request really convinces us of this commission's total lack of credibility," he told Associated Press. "There is not a single tangible element in this case that can confirm the suspicions."

Platini and Blatter say the payment was covered by a verbal contract, and that the £1.3m payment was the balance of an agreed dea0 worth one million Swiss francs a year, delayed because FIFA could not afford to pay it at the time.

Platini will challenge any ban at the Court of Arbitration for Sport, with the aim of entering the FIFA presidential election, which will be held on 26 February.