MOSCOW — The leaders of soccer in Europe stood around the marble-floored lobby of a Hyatt hotel in Kiev, Ukraine, last month, trading gossip about one of their former colleagues: FIFA President Gianni Infantino.
Infantino had worked for UEFA, European soccer’s governing body, for nearly two decades, ultimately serving as the organization’s equivalent of a chief executive. Then, in 2016, he became UEFA’s handpicked candidate for his current role, the most powerful job in the sport. But two years later, the warm words and good feelings that had trailed Infantino as he left UEFA’s lakeside headquarters near Geneva to run FIFA have all but evaporated.