What Next For FIFA And Qatar As Blatter Exits?

When Sepp Blatter opened the envelope revealing Qatar as the host of the 2022 World Cup, even the practised performer could not suppress a hint of surprise and disappointment.

He knew it would mean trouble.

Quite how much trouble even he cannot have forseen.

The dramatic fall we have witnessed this week arguably began in December 2010.

The selection of Qatar, tiny, sweltering Qatar, a country whose only qualification to host the tournament is its ambition, was an affront even to those inured to FIFA's scandalous conduct over two decades.

Perhaps crucially, it was an affront to the US, a genuine contender for a World Cup that found itself snubbed.

Small 'p' sports politics and global power plays intersected in the Qatar election and what followed.

But for Blatter it unleashed forces he could not for once control.

Investigations, both the dogged journalistic kind, and those of the FBI and the Swiss police, have ultimately brought him down.

Nothing he did, not shifting the tournament to winter, or commissioning internal inquiries, could ultimately protect him.

So what happens now to a tournament that still seems preposterous?

Will Blatter's departure spell the end for the Emirate's dream of the first Middle-Eastern World Cup?

Much depends on the identity of the next FIFA president and their appetite for trouble.

Qatar will defend its tournament to the last.

It has already been cleared of wrongdoing by FIFA's still unpublished Garcia inquiry.

And unpicking the discredited election of December 2010 without imperilling the Russia World Cup will be hard given the vote-trading that underpinned both successful bids.

Given all that, perhaps the question to ask in the wake of Blatter’s resignation was not "why now?", but "why he would want to stay?"

As we were reminded in his victory speech, FIFA's self-styled captain loves a nautical theme.

But it did occur while we watched, that with storm clouds gathering on all sides, whether he would want to be on deck when they finally arrived.

A weekend of meditation appears to have led Captain Blatter to the same conclusion.

Having spent Tuesday morning in conference with his lawyers and advisors, reviewing the implications of two criminal inquiries and a groundswell of opposition from football's wealthiest nations and their political leaders, he walked.

Blatter's exit strategy is characteristically political and astute.

He will not go immediately, rather he will stay on for at least four and probably nine months to oversee what he calls a final push for reform.

But crucially it also gives him control of the process, and a chance to influence the choice of his successor.

Were he to succeed it would be a disaster for FIFA's prospects of meaningful reform.

Whoever is next needs to have a mandate not just to clean up the system of slush-funds and patronage, but to look back and investigate the Blatter years in full.