Former FIFA President Sepp Blatter and French legend Michel Platini were both cleared of corruption charges by a Swiss court on Tuesday, two-and-a-half years after they were first acquitted of the offences.
The pair, once among the most powerful figures in global football, were cleared of fraud mismanagement at the Extraordinary Appeals Chamber of the Swiss Criminal Court in the town of Muttenz, near Basel.
Both men had denied the charges which related to a 2 million Swiss franc (£1.6m) payment made to Platini, who was UEFA president at the time, in 2011.
But on Tuesday, the pair were acquitted for a second time on charges of fraud, forgery, mismanagement, and misappropriation of FIFA money.
“When you talk about falsehoods, lies, and deception, that’s not me. That didn’t exist in my whole life,” he had said during the retrial in early March.
