Football execs attend 62nd FIFA Congress

The football world descended on Budapest, Hungary, for the 62nd FIFA Congress including Cook Islands Football Association delegates.

Representing the Cook Islands were CIFA President Lee Harmon along with vice president Jake Numanga, board members John-Paul Wilson and Moeroa Tamangaro.

FIFA president Joseph S. Blatter invited the FIFA Congress to give its full support to the current reform process of football’s world governing body until the 2013 congress according to the established road map.

The congress received a review of FIFA’s finances for 2011, as well as an update on FIFA’s current financial situation.

Financial and activity reports for 2011 and budgets for 2011 were discussed and approved. The budget for 2012 was also presented to the congress and adopted.

Furthermore, the congress approved an amendment to the FIFA Statutes for the creation of the Independent Governance Committee and Task Forces.

Doctor Rangiau Fariu also accompanied the CIFA delegates and attended the 2nd FIFA Medical Conference.

Headed by the chairman of the FIFA medical committee, Michel D’Hooghe, and FIFA’s chief medical officer, professor Jiri Dvorak, the two-day conference discussed a number of issues with the aim of developing medical practices associated with the beautiful game. The first day of proceedings was set aside for medical specialists and day two was reserved for discussion of major issues including sudden heart attacks, training accidents, FIFA’s 11+ warm-up programme and pre-match medicals, in addition to any other football-related issues raised by participants.

Doctor Fariu commented on the benefits of the conference where it focused on the prevention of injuries for football players and where the use of a defibrillator was important during a match in the event of sudden heart attacks.

”Certain exercises were demonstrated to prevent injuries which I found interesting,“ he says. ”And the use of a defibrillator during a world cup match or any FIFA matches caught my attention.

”I was privileged to exchange views and ideas with other medical doctors from around the world which allowed me to network with them.“

He went on to say that he was impressed with how the bigger countries had different medical doctors in the different areas and the abundance of medical resources compared to that of the Cook Islands.

”This is my first time attending a football medical conference and it was an eye opener for me. It was worth the 50 hours of travelling to Hungary,“ he laughed.