Qatar still not satisfied with Asia chief over Infantino letter

Aug 20 : The Qatar Football Association has reiterated its concerns over the lack of consultation with members before the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) signed an open letter with UEFA and CONCACAF criticising FIFA President Gianni Infantino.

Infantino, who is seeking reelection next year, has faced open revolt after the letter attacked his conduct over the aborted bid to bring private investment into the World Cup and called into question his leadership.

In the third letter in a testy exchange, all of which have been seen by Reuters, QFA President Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, an Infantino loyalist, said the AFC's response to his original complaint "raised considerably more questions than it answers".

"The AFC reply amounts to an admission that no consultation took place, whether with the AFC executive committee, with individual member associations, or otherwise, prior to the statement being issued in their name," Al-Thani wrote in Wednesday's letter.

"However extensively the AFC reply addresses the substance of the FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) proposal, FIFA's own conduct, or the history of AFC's public statements, none of that bears on the narrow and unanswered question of whether AFC's membership was consulted before the statement was issued in their name. 

"It was not."

One of the main complaints levelled at Infantino over his FFE proposal was that it was developed without the consultation of the confederations and pitched directly to FIFA's 211 member associations. 

Qatar were among six members of the AFC which declared their support for Infantino early in the crisis that was triggered by the failed proposal.

For such an exchange between senior figures to be made public is highly unusual at the AFC, which usually likes